Could you please clarify the point for us?

Just for kicks I'll take a guess... keep in mind this is only a guess of the emergency broadcasting system.

We are atheists, we know for sure that god doesn't exist. How could we know for sure that God doesn't exist, maybe God is an alien. Am I close at all Reddragon?

then we can't know him and thusly can't logically believe he exists.

I don't believe that God is unknowable.

Do you have good reasons for preferring the possibility that God does exist over the possibility that God does not exist?

For there to be an "all knowing great being" being dazzles my mind. For starters, what is that being made of? Where did it come from, itself? Why would it care about our every move, tick and thought?

If such a being truly existed, wouldn't it be so incredibly intelligent and "all knowing" that it would not in fact be prone to such primitive emotions and concepts of morality as we are? Therefore, it would understand that watching us obsessively like a perverted stalker would not in fact matter or even make the smallest difference in the overall structure of our world.

We are simply a small fragment of the universe. Not to say we're unimportant, but I believe there are other organisms out there. It's true, it is possible just as flying pink invisible unicorns are, but not only is it irrational to believe in a God, it is also such a close-minded way of thinking. To believe that a "god" or an "all knowing being" watching us completely clashes with the facts of the universe. There are so many other logical theories based on more valid evidence and scientific principles.

Of course, I'm one of those people that thinks in the great scheme of existence, there is no good or evil, so I boggle my mind to no end with these questions. I hope I make SOME sense here.

and...I think I just gave myself a headache.... :smt030

To me, and alien is a being that isn't from this planet. That would make God, angles, and demons all aliens. I use the word alien because it isn't as mystical as the word God. What is a god in the first place? I wanted to use a word that didn't cary all the extra baggage that comes with the word god. If I design and program a virtual world, I'm god in that world as I have total control(ultimate power) in that world. But I'm not god of the world in which I exist. Could it be the same with God? At this point it doesn't make since to say god when we say He is God of this world but have no clue weather or not He's god of His own world.

Ummmm.... I'm not sure you got my point, but I hope I made it clear in other posts.

I prefer the possibility that God does exist because of personal experiences with God weather during prayer, praise and worship, or even in church. I've even had experiences with the super natural, and how spirits respond to prayer since childhood.

I don't see how being able to discuss our identity would lessen the value of the program. If anything it makes it more interesting. If human society lasts long enough it would be nice to see how far AI goes.

I don't think there are limited amouts of reason. I think there are limited amounts of perception.

Would you have any chioce??? And what is this need for perfection? What is perfection anyways? I think we all would have different views on what it is. To me perfection is the best posible. Where's webster when you need him? LoL

I said that wrong... it should be:

I believe God exists because of personal experiences with God weather during prayer, praise and worship, or even in church. I've even had experiences with the super natural since childhood. Also it's interesting how spirits respond to prayer or even the name of Jesus.

If you can experience phenomena, how can it be supernatural? The supernatural is by definition outside the realm of experience. Why do you trust your personal experiences?

No, thats not what I mean. I never thought about God's reasons in the analogy. I did think about posible human reasons though. There are god games out now that allow you to rule civilizations. You can answere prayers, or punish at will.

I was thinking that if we don't destroy ourselves first that ai could posibly reach a point to where fake intelligence may rival real intelligence. Think of having a virtual pet with enough intelligence to question it's own existence. It may even question your existence. Now that would be interesting.

Yeah but by reasoning we gain thoughts, and ideas. Perception is just a way these thoughts and ideas may be confirmed as true or false. So we may not be limited as far as what we think about. But we are limited when it comes to finding evidence to back up those thoughts.

If God is perfect and perfect is God, then nothing can be perfect but God. I agree with the theist that God is perfect but I wouldn't define perfection as being God. I think that perfect is a reletive term in that we all have different views on what perfect is and it varies based on what object we're talking about.

I might be, I might not be. I'm as real as real can be, without being 100% absolutely sure. Once again, the interesting thing is, I am more sure the Christian God isn't real, as I'm sure that I am real.

I don't, I never claimed to, and this has nothing to do with verifying that your god is real.

Well duh, any intellectual wouldn't be happy with that, as god himself would've needed someone to cause him, unless he was infinite, in which case it's just as likely that the Universe didn't need a creator as it too could be infinite.

Nope. Disbelief encompasses everyone who is unsure. You either have positive belief or are you without that belief. If you are unsure, then you are without positive belief and therefore an atheist. You need to check your definition of disbelief.

From Oxford English Dictionary.

disbelieve: Not to believe or credit (pertinent part of definition)

I don't claim that he doesn't exist, although non-cognitivists make a compelliung argument as to why he doesn't exist.

Everyone on the Rational Response Squad is agnostic, in addition to being atheist. You should get educated on these terms as to how they're really defined, not how American Christians have chosen to bastardize the definitions. This paper will help you understand the terms agnostic and atheist much better.

What I'm referring to is the conclusions that you draw from your personal experiences. Several times a year, I have sleep paralysis. I don't draw the conclusion that I?m visited by demons or abducted by aliens. If you accept a naturalistic model for interpreting the data, then other far more likely explanations present themselves.

I'm only going on observation I'm no psychologist. Lesser creatures apear to not have these primitive emotions. Take chickens for an example. You can kill a chicken in front of other chickens, and they will appear to not care at all.

So is primitive bad? I'm assuming you're calling emotions primitive in order to show that they are bad so as to discredit God for having such emotions. We can't argue about what is good or bad unless you want to argue about oppinions. Good and bad are relative terms and very based on each person's point of view. It's like if I say chocolate ice cream is good and you say it's bad. It's only oppinion. Here I would say emotions, weather primitive or not, are good.

I thought you brought the primitive emotions thing up... Maybe I should scroll back to see...

This would be like the parent who doesn't let his kid watch TV because there's bad stuff on it. He doesn't let his kid go outside, or go on the internet, or hang out with friends. In a way this becomes something like a prison.

Dynamic possibilty is what makes this world interesting. Lows make the highs more appreciable and less mundane.

Also, here again we're back to the topic of good and bad. Is it good of God to make the world like it is? The answere to this question would only be a matter of oppinion.

There's more in the experience then just a feeling. There's information such as identification, images, etc. I know God when I experience His presence because of the information within the experience. Experiencing the presence of God is unique. But then experienceing the pressence of any spirit/alien is unique. I think that within the experience we perseive characteristics that ID the one behind the experience. Sort of like when I see people. I can recognize people I know by specific physical characteristics.

Here's the way I see it. It's like there realy is a sixth or even a seventh sense, but it's hard to explain except by relating these extra senses to the first five. Here's an example of what I mean: How do you explain to a blind person what clouds look like or what the color red looks like? You can't. But how do you explain a smell to someone who's never been able to smell? You can by relating the smell to a taste. That's why above I compared percieving a spirit's identifying characteristics to seeing a persons physical identifying characteristics.

I hope that was clear.

Are you trying to say I'm crazy??? LoL

BTW I wonder how wiccans would explain their experiences. Specialy since they focus more time studying spiritual stuff and it's effect on this physical world.

OK, Reddragon has invited me to watch his posts on experiencing God... I have to admit that it's pretty clear for me now...

Question for Reddragon: you say you can sort out a God experience because of the information it provides. Now it's about time you take up a challenge: "Is the information I receive actual information, or is it just what I expect to receive? In what way is a God experience different from a dream or a hallucination? Isn't God from my visions (or whatever they are) "just how I imagined him", just because I've imagined him that way? Doesn't that God only match up to my every expectation and moral principle, just because they are my expectations and moral principles?"

I, for one, have experimented much in the "dreamworld"... it's an activity that I probably will never get tired of... I have learned how to control events in dreams, I have learned to hang on to that short edge between awake and dream, in which you are on "dreamy time dilation", but still approximately lucid, and such... and I have found out that it is possible to dream the contents of an entire lifetime during one night... You are able to imagine many details, many memories, many events and fictional characters and situations, and you are able to make them all link together... just as if you were sitting on an armchair and telling your grandsons "Oh... when I was young like you... what a rascal I used to be !" and such... I have also found out that such experiences (which I like to call "sentient auto-pilot experiences" can very much happen during daytime, in certain conditions... By this moment we know that a full hour of continuous, concentrated prayer acts almost like a hypnosis session... only that you do not go past the edge between awake and asleep... and that's when all the interesting stuff happens...

I opened the other topic related to God experiences not because I didn't know what "God experiences" are... I opened it because I wanted to see what people think, what people know about these experiences... and about the mass hallucinations that have been reported in several areas around the globe...

floatingegg - the explanation that doesn't require God to be plausible has just been given... but it will take many more years / generations for us to know enough about how the brain manages information in order to be able to understand all its mysteries.

And if a Christian lies, what does that make him?

I don't get it... where did I lie???

Hello

Ahhh... You got me thinking back to my childhood. Now I think I know what it's like to be an atheist. I remember being tought about God but no evidence that He was real. I just believed because I trusted my parents.

The experiences came later, even before I became a Christian. At that time I didn't know anything about experiencing the presence of God, so when it happened it came as a surprise. Also these experiences happened outside of church (as far as I knew church was fake as I never learned anything nor experienced anything in chruch at that time - I learned from that that there are good churches and bad ones). Sorry if I get off topic.

To answere your question: the information is actual information because in the begining I never expected it. Now I do expect it because of repitition. But you can even tell if God is happy with you at times, you can also tell if He's leading you in a particular direction. When people talk about being guided by the Holy Spirit, this is what they're talking about.

It's different from a dream because you can be fully awake, driving a car. You could shout "halleluja(sp)!!!", or "Praise God!!!", and bam! There's an experience(or not, it's up to God) right there while you're driving.

Hallucinations would deal more with visions or things you think you see. My experiences don't realy have anything to do with seeing anything. Ok, I admit there have been a few times, but not often.

I didn't know what to expect with my first few experiences because I didn't know of such a thing as experiencing God's prescence. So there were no expectations to shape my view of what a God experience should be like. Now I have expectations. I expect future experiences to match up with older ones. This is just the result of repitition.

Ahhh... Playing with dreams can be fun. I used to do it a little. Now the only time I like to take control of my dreams is when I want to fly. ooooo.. flying is sooooo funnnn... LoL

Heh.. I know. It can be like going to a different state of conciousness. This can happen in less than an hour. I usualy stick to short prayers though.

Oh yeah. I know about this. I hate that state. I've been stuck between sleep and awake before. And it's not fun. Ofcourse I think this is the state wichins go to in order to do astral travel.

I don't know much about hallucinations. I try to stay away from strange mushrooms. LoL

Ok, really. What are you talking about? What mass hallucinations?