Talk:God/Archive 15

This is an archive of past discussions about God. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 10

←

Archive 13

→

Doesn't read like an encyclopedia article

I'm not entirely sure how this article maintains it's GA standing. Reading over it, it certainly doesn't appear anything like an encyclopedia article in parts, it's vandalized routinely, and people use it as their overt and subtle ground for making PoV and unsubstantiated statements. In an article on God I expect to see something like an overview of what 'God' means generically to faiths, maybe some basic historical and theological concepts behind it through time, and so on. It should be neutral, precisely because it's so contentious. I don't really need to see what percentage of scientists don't believe in him in one study, or what percent of politicians do in another. (or her really, though since the topic is God not Goddess I keep to the masculine here, just as in an article on 'Goddess' I would keep in the feminine). You wouldn't find either of those in a normal encyclopedia for good reason. Instead people seem to be trying to post things on disproving god, studies whose viewpoint/neutrality isn't proven, and the like. I understand it's hard to talk about god in any way for people of either side with neutrality, but sometimes I think with something like this we'd be better off just trying to get someone more professional to pony up, give it a good once over, then lock it down without a damn good reason to change it. The idea of a encyclopedia everyone chips in on is great at times, but ever time I check back here after a few months I just can't help but be stricken by how unprofessional and biased this always looks compared to say looking at a normal article here compared to it's normal encyclopedia equivlants. I mean has anyone ever kept up on this page a few days in a row when someone devoutely religious and someone devoutly anti-religious go at it with edits here? Neither side ever putting up something truly fair and appropriate? And then the people who do are stuck trying to edit both of them? Then again I suppose I'd make this same article about most hot button topics here, most religions sub pages, political pages, and the like. Still I think this could just be done so much better then it is and I just wish I was the kind of person with the skill to do it but sadly I'm not. Hopefully some people with the skill and neutrality to do it will show up, or at least some of the people who want to use Wiki as a forum not as the encyclopedia that it is will back off more. [Monday, 2007-01-08 T 23:17 UTC]

I share those sentiments, although not your bias :) The number of scientist who believe in God might be relevant to the Science and Religion question; but in as much as such numbers are used to argue against God, it is not encyclopedic. For example, the caption under the map states "Countries with Catholic or Muslim majorities tend to poll highest." Yes, it is probably true, but why does it have to be mentioned? --Merzul 16:01, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm unclear upon what basis you are calling that biased. That is a pretty pointed accusation in a discussion. It gets tossed around too much here when people want to make someone else look wrong, usually when they themselves are simply 'biased' towards the opposite view. I make it clear where I see bias, you accuse me of it but don't clarify that rather hefty accusation. I fail to see how wanting this article to remain neutral and keep off topic issues out of it makes me 'biased'. I've made it absolutely clear I am no more comfortable with Liberals or Radicals, Anti-Religious or Religious zealots, posting views against or for God in an article that should only in an encyclopedic article talk about him in a general sense of mankinds historic views on the matter, what he means in a theological and historical sense, views on thae nature of limited or full omnipotence/omniscience as it applies to the concept and so on (much like how an article on automobiles shouldn't discuss polution, that should be it's own article, but you might see discussion on differant types of automobiles through history and so on). If a mention wants to be made that his existance is debated that's fine, but to actually attempt to debate it in either direction here smacks of discussion and debate which is innappropriate in an encyclopedia article. If you feel my 'bias' is I want this to look more like a 'conventional' encyclopedia article and question it's GA standing because it doesn't then I don't think that's a bias, I think that's intelligence given the reasons it doesn't look like one. Wikipedia at times ends up being more an internet interactive arguement forum then a collective encyclopedia of knowledge. That isn't bias, you can look at this article and open up ANY respected encyclopedia and see the differences to know it's right. People aren't adding brilliant insight here, they're arguing for their side. Their's nothing wrong with that by the way, in a forum for discussion or debate, but NOT in an encyclopedia. [Monday, 2007-01-08 T 23:17 UTC]

It was really not my intention to imply that you are biased. I wanted to say that although we probably have contrary POVs, I too feel this articles tries too hard to argue against God. --Merzul 02:08, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Do we have an article for "God the Biblical Figure" etcetera?

I mean we have "Christian views of God" I think, but that's different. Shouldn't we have an article examining the "God in the Bible", much like we have one for "Lot in the Bible" etcetera? If we don't already, of course.--Steven X 07:58, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

And the same goes of the other notable (but distiguishable) literary figures also called God.--Steven X 08:00, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Well we have "Biblical definition of God" but that's different.--Steven X 08:04, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

When I first read the definition of God, I noticed it was lumped together with Judaism and Islam. The God that is used in the Bible can not in Biblical perspective be grouped together with the god of Islam. Their should be a distinction made between God (of the Bible) and god. A separate entry would be one way to correct this.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Dwiering (talk • contribs)

And I suppose you have peer-reviewed published findings of how the Christian god is different from the Islamic god? No? The only separation that is possible would be like "Christian belief in god", "Islamic belief in god", "Sumerian belief in god" etc - if you can find proper references that have relevant data. This article is as bound by wikipedia quality standards as any other. Regardless of what your personal faith is, the bible, the koran or any other text that defines god is not a peer-reviewed source. Ontologically from the wikipedia point of view "god" is no different from any other fictional character in literature. The only difference between the god character and say Darth Vader is that more people believe that god is not fictional than that believe that Darth Vader isn't fictional. This is important when describing people's faith in god (as an anthropological issue), but has nothing to do with the god character itself. It doesn't make it any more real (see argumentum ad populum).

Regardless of what your faith is, from a wikipedia point of view the bible, koran and any other religious texts are works of fiction. Faith which is belief without evidence has no place here - it is the very opposite of what wikipedia tries to do. So articles on religion should be kept to the same standards as any other articles. --Denoir 05:16, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

I was just using the God as a Biblical Charachter as an example, I'm not spiritual or religious and yes I know what your saying.--Steven X 08:57, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Also, the Qu'ran may be based on the Bible--but it cannot really be considered a spin-off, can it?--Steven X 09:01, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

I was actually responding to Dwiering's post and his request for distinction between "God" and "god". --Denoir 18:55, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Ah. Any thoughts on anything that I've said, though?--Steven X 11:14, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Powerful people's belief in God

I don't see why you guys have a problem with this sentence. "Several people in powerful positions however have and do hold to the idea of God's existence too." Does this really a need a cite? Do you deny it's true? It is simply a counter point to the idea of God being rooted in oppression. It is not an argument from authority, as it never says God exists because powerful people believe in God. It is simply counter evidence to the other point. Roy Brumback 08:09, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how power has any relevance to anything. Taking, say, George W. Bush as an example: he is a Christian, he got elected because he is Christian (among other reasons), which simply says that many Americans are Christian (obviously they wouldn't elect a hard atheist). But how is anyone being in a position of power of any relevance? Richard001 10:18, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

It has relevance to the issue of whether the idea of God is rooted in oppression. If you're powerful, you're not oppressed. Roy Brumback 20:23, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

It is unsourced, non specific useless commentary. "several people"? "powerful positions"? And this has what, precisely, to do with the article God? KillerChihuahua^?!? 16:54, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

It's not commentary, it's simply pointing out that there is countervailing evidence against that thesis. If you wish, I can cite the recent National Geographic book on world religions that states that Christianity has largely been the religion of the powerful and elite, although I don't really think that's wholly true either. And if we can put in that Marxist writers assert that the idea of God is rooted in oppression, an argument from motive to boot, how come we can not also point out that there is evidence against this thesis? If one belongs in the God article, why not the other? Roy Brumback 04:05, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

The entire Marxism section and rebuttal are too loaded, and should be stated in more neutral terms. First of all, Marx theory of alienation is simplified to powerlessness under oppression. I personally feel uneasy that this is attributed to Jonathan Wolff, but it seems I have too high demands on attribution. (In my opinion it's just a matter of responsible academic writing.) Now, the refutation is just plainly WP:OR: how is a theory of the development of religion a logical fallacy? Marx is not saying that "religion is believed by powerless people, therefore God does not exist!" Any attempt at citing figures to prove Marx wrong is really the kind of crackpot philosophy that WP:SYNT is trying to avoid. --Merzul 17:19, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

I will restate this in more positive terms: Christian philosophers must have proposed sophisticated arguments against Marx that can be used here. I'm not against including refutations of Marx, but I don't like doing a google search on Marx "appeal to motive" and look through them and not finding anybody who has argued this except wikipedia and Marx "argument from motive" has 209 results, all of which are wikipedia clones. This is just very bad, and I wanted to give a long explanation of how this damages wikipedia's reputation on your talk page, where I noticed that you are eager to demand sources from others: "cite needed for conclusion about importance"?!? That's almost as high standards as I have. Please apply the same standards of attribution to your own edits as you demand from others! Right now I'm very disappointed, as it seems you are aware of wikipedia policy, but only use it when it favors your opinion. --Merzul 01:59, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for questioning my motives and assuming bad faith on my part. Importance is a subjective conclusion. Here I am simply pointing out a logical fallacy. Here is what atheism.com says about Marx's opinion of religion-

"Religious distress is at the same time the expression of real distress and the protest against real distress. (motive) Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people. (motive) The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is required for their real happiness. (Appeal to consequences) The demand to give up the illusion about its condition is the demand to give up a condition which needs illusions. (motive).

Now do you disagree that these are logical fallacies? Roy Brumback 09:09, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

I have held high views of you for quite some time, in fact, it seemed to me that you are a reasonable person, but slightly uninformed about WP:V. I was extremely annoyed to see that you are aware of citation policies when it applies to other people. But to get back to the point... I still disagree, it is not the matter of whether some words by Marx can be reformulated into arguments that are informal logical fallacies, the point is that claiming an entire philosophical theory is an "appeal to motive", is just pure disrespect for philosophy. There are theist answers to Marx, so why not use serious criticism??? And if I am wrong and somebody has really been this disrespectful, then we can cite him, just as we can cite Richard Dawkins disrespectful dismissal of theological arguments. The point is that he should take the blame for being disrespectful, not wikipedia. --Merzul 14:13, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Well thanks. Now it seems disrespectful of philosophy to me to use logical fallacies. If you really want me to cite someone else pointing out that these are just that, I'll get back to you when I find them. But notice that the claim about religion being based on oppression and it being the opium of the people is already listed as an example of the appeal to consequences fallacy. Roy Brumback 05:58, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Well that is just a terrible shame, all these bold statements may be true, but they are in dire need of attribution. These are not just obviously true and trivial things, we are saying that a philosopher's incredibly complicated theory that I don't fully understand are basically ad hominem arguments. I'm not at all comfortable that we are making such claims! --Merzul 00:37, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

What is an Arguments from motive?

I will try to explain the difference between an argument from motive, and a psychological account of religion. For this purpose, let's assume John is a lonely little child with no friends and a lively imagination, but he claims he has an invisible friend Peter. Now, an argument from motive to prove Peter does not exist would go like this:

John claims his invisible friend Peter exists.
John wants Peter to exist, so he would be less lonely.
Therefore, Peter does not exist.

That is truly an argument from motive and is not valid. However, John's mother surely does not believe that Peter exists. Obviously she is not guilty of an argument from motive! She probably thinks something like the following:

John claims his invisible friend Peter exists.
It makes sense for lonely and creative children to make up invisible friends.
It is possible that John invented Peter.
Since nobody else has seen Peter, it is highly probable that John invented Peter.
It is more rational to believe Peter doesn't exist.

This is very similar to Marx and Freudian accounts of belief, they may be horrible explanations, but they are not arguments from motive! It is a big difference between giving an explanation of why people believe in God and making an argument from motive. Anyway, these are my final words on this issue, if you want to keep these trivializing refutations rather than proper responses by Christian philosophers, then so be it. I did my best, so I wash my hands of this responsibility, and let you decide what quality of encyclopedia you want wikipedia to be. --Merzul 00:37, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

It isn't more rational. It's just more probable. Rational simply means using reason, and reason is simply taking assumptions and seeing what ideas are then true or not true based on those assumptions. Now only if you assume that I haven't seen Peter, therefore he doesn't exist, can you conclude that Peter doesn't exist. But most agree that is not really logically valid. You can't really prove something doesn't exist just because you haven't found it yourself. Now of course if my kid was telling me this story, I wouldn't believe him, but it's no more rational for me to assert Peter's not there than to assume I just can't see him. Either one could be just as true. Reason doesn't really yield truth, unless you use correct assumptions, but there is no logical way to tell which assumptions are true. You simply have to believe them or not. In the end, it goes right back to a matter of faith.

As for Marx, certainly you can explore psychological motivations for beliefs without determining whether they are true or not, but that's not what Marx did. He simply assumed God didn't exist and then said people only believe in God for economic reasons, not allowing for the possibility that they might simply be believing in the truth, and he said that people will only be truly happy if they stop believing in God. Implicit in all this is the unproven assumption that God doesn't exist. If that isn't proven, the rest is argument from motive and consequence. Same with Freud. People simply believe in God for psychological reasons and therefore he doesn't exist, never allowing for the possibility of belief in God being based on valid reasons, like meeting God for instance. And like I said, if you want me to cite someone else pointing all this out, I'll get back to you when I find it. Roy Brumback 09:06, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Jonathan Wolff

It would be very nice, if somebody with knowledge of Marx's philosophy would check if attributing this interpretation of Marx's theory ("powerlessness under oppression") to Wolff is fair. I could not by reading the article make certain that this is Wolff's interpretation of Marx. Note that the word "powerless" or "powerlessness" doesn't appear in Wolff's treatment, so maybe a better source could be provided, or if anybody knows Marx, could give a more adequate account of what Wolff is talking about. --Merzul 03:26, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Bias towards christian God

This article is biased towards christian God. The only pictures are those of christian God. Since his existence is as probable as Zeus` and Ganesh`s, I recommend that this article would move towards a more neutral direction. In the intro section the picture once again depicts christian God. The picture should be replaced with the picture of an "extinct god" like Zeus or Wotan.

I will change the pictures myself unless someone wont address these concerns here. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 88.114.239.44 (talk • contribs).

-i agree please change this-—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 86.17.108.147 (talk • contribs).

I disagree. What you're asking making no sense. First you state essentially that all gods are equal in your opinion and the Christian god is just the same as any other. Then you say using his picture is favoring one religion. However logically that same arguement could be made for any god pictured. Thus the only arguement you could logically have made was to allow no picture at all, and had you made that arguement I might have actually believed you wanted neutrality. The fact your conclussion is to replace him with another god shows infact you are a biased individual yourself, biased against the Christian god in your resulting request and infact to you all gods aren't equal. Now from the standpoint of an encyclopdia the choice here of a picture of a god (yes, in this case the judeo/christian and to some extent islamic god) is from a famous work that is avaliable for free and so can be used here, and is perfectly appropriate to WPs standards on them. [Monday, 2007-01-08 T 23:17 UTC]

Sigh.. extinct god is neutral towards ALL religions, since there are no Zeus worshippers today in the world. In the future islam is the religion with the greatest number of worshippers. Maybe they want to change the picture to represent islam someway when they are numerically superiour to christians. Of course Allah cant be represented in pictures, so maybe a picture of Allah`s creation the nature would be appropriate to the muslims? I dont think many muslims approve the Michelangelos painting as the best depiction of god. Christians are not a majority in the world today. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 88.114.239.44 (talk) 15:45, 11 January 2007 (UTC).

Well according to the Bible, or atleast from what I've heard. You shall not make pictures of God. There is one reason I though, probably because we dont know how our Lord looks like?

Existence of God

Since the existence of God is not proven, it is quite suprising that this article doesnt mention it in the "existence of God" section. Instead it might give the false impression that God can be proven. It is relevant to point out in this article that from a logical perspective christian God`s existence is as probable as is the existence of the Invisible Pink Unicorns. Otherwise people reading this article might get the impression that belief in God is somehow logical.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 88.114.239.44 (talk • contribs).

Perhaps it is proven, we don’t know. Since history sometimes tells us otherwise, we should not say that people can't express themselves (for) his existence. And along with science there are some scientific theories telling us that a creator God does exist. For example Einstein’s equation of the universe described that the universe was created by someone, which I myself and Einstein believed was God. But later Einstein started to change his thoughts because he was uncertain of which purpose the universe was created; since there are so much evil in the world he changed his belief.

Unaware of how the Bible describes the purpose greatly he started to think that God would only create a perfect universe and because of that he started to think that there was no God.

If you think that the Bible isn't true scientific, you’re wrong. If you don’t believe in God The Bible also describes various places on earth. And it does neither say in any way that the earth is flat or that the earth circulates around the sun. But in other ways the Bible indicates in several places that the earth is a sphere suspended in space, with day and night existing simultaneously. Go to http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/false.html#sun for more information. Isn't that cool? At least I believe, if you don't try to find out more before saying something like that.

I've also seen a documentary, though it is a documentary I’m not sure it's right. But for example they have found the Garden of Eden as it is placed on earth by following several descriptions from the Bible. Surrounded by mountains and with a nature so pure a man could sleep on the grass and live all life without having something to hide by. And as geologist had the place examined, they were able to create an image of the nature there, and as beautiful it was it was very much like the place the Bible described.

As said before I believe people have good reasons to believe in God, though it's every mans right to do.

/Philip EK

Names for God

Hello,

First I would like to say that I enjoy this page and appreciate the thoughtful work that has gone into it.

I would like you to consider adding, under the article "Names for God"

"Principle, Mind, Soul, Life, Truth, Love, and Spirit are names for God in Christian Science. These names are synonymous and indicate God's wholeness."

If one were to look up Mind, Soul ect. in some dictionaries it will say "In Christian Science - God". This is an indication to me that these terms add an important and unique insight into the nature of Diety that has not been mention yet in this article.

Thank you for your sincere interest.

Simplywater 07:45, 8 January 2007 (UTC) simplywater

I don't know why, but I actually checked this, and Mind and Soul are indeed in dictionary.com -- I was a bit surprised, but some of the others were not, so do you have an official source for all the other names? In that case, I would not object to adding the above line. --Merzul 20:47, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

M-W.com, the Webster's Dictionary Web site lists these definitions. Thanks for checking it out!

Yes, this is also true, but since the line in question is not a quotation, I don't feel comfortable adding something I don't know anything about, so I ask you to add that line yourself. To be more in tune with the neutral style used on wikipedia I would suggest: Principle, Mind, Soul, Life, Truth, Love, and Spirit are names for God in [[Christian Science]]. These names are considered synonymous and indicative of God's wholeness. I can only imagine anybody objecting to this on the ground that this section is getting very long, but try to add it and we'll see if anybody objects. However, try to stay cool, people might object, if you start adding this to all the articles about love, mind, etc... --Merzul 23:54, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

your wording is fine by me. But I don't know how to add anything to the God artcle. There aren't any "edit" places. Why would people object if this were added to articles about love, ect if it is a legitimate definition? It's a good thing to told me to think about it. I will consider your words of wisdom. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Simplywater (talk • contribs) 09:05, 10 January 2007 (UTC).

So, I inserted the sentence, and then someone removed it. How do I have a dialogue with those who question it? Simplywater 17:38, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, you added it to Names of God yesterday, and it's still there. I see you've added it to God as well just now. I think both of those are appropriate, but if anyone objects, you can discuss it here (for the God page) or on Talk:Names of God for that page. bikeable (talk) 17:45, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I just got lost on this page. I'm a little new. I only ment to have it once. Either God or names for God. Maybe it didn't get removed, I just couldn't find it. Any ideas where you think it should go?Simplywater 18:14, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Photo @ top

hey everybody just wanted to comment on the photo of 'God' on the top of the God page... perhaps switching that out with the sun photo just underneath that? I understand the michelangelo is an image many people can connect with - an omniscient ever present santa character/father figure, this pervading idea of God having the beard, etc - but it somehow doesn't seem appropriate to give such a terribly important subject a face. Thanks! 88.147.9.21 03:28, 11 January 2007 (UTC)mjit, 200788.147.9.21 03:28, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Already discussed two topics above you. This arguement makes no sense for the reasons I listed there. The only logical arguement you can make with that logic is no picture, not a changed picture. Since the general concensus seems to be a picture for the page is nice, someone picked one from a famous work of art. By picking it on its artistic merit and fame and not by choice of faith they used about the only neutral standard you'd find and still be able to put a picture up here. Lets also not forget for wikipedia it has to be in the common domain or consented for use here, and that picture was. [Monday, 2007-01-08 T 23:17 UTC]

Ok, but its clear that it would be more neutral towards all religions if it would depict an extinct god like Zeus. It would be neutral towards all religions, since there are no Zeus worshippers anymore. And unlike you who has an anglocentric worldview I understand that the majority of worlds people are not christians and dont appreciate Michelangelo like your biased mind does.

What if in the future nobody believes in the christian God and everybody believes in Ganesh? Would they still keep the christian god picture there? I doubt it. Biased it is. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 88.114.239.44 (talk) 15:53, 11 January 2007 (UTC).

As a Christian who does not believe that God has a physical form, or feel that it is in Christianity's best intrest to promote a physical male God, I would feel more comfortable if the caption read that the painting was Michelangelos' perception of the Christian God. He is an important historical figure and artist who painted religious subjects, but in truth, the painting is his perception, and does not completly reflect the whole of Christianity. Simplywater 20:38, 11 January 2007 (UTC)