Posted by Baron Greenback [216.54.16.204 - ip-216-54-16-204.coxfiber.net] on 11 July 2003 at 00.04.13 ZuluTime:

In Reply to: god, and rules posted by Richard Vaughan on 10 July 2003 at 20.04.44 ZuluTime:

First and foremost, let me clarify something. "Isn't it possible" doesn't equate to "is the best explanation", or "is fact". A lot of things are possible. Just this morning, I talked someone into quitting cigarettes and giving me theirs, just so I wouldn't have to buy a pack. But, that doesn't change the fact that I will have to support my own habit if I want to continue smoking, as this was actually a freak occurence (or at least, that's what I want you to think >:) ). Anyway, as long as that's understood, we can move on.

On the subject of a god existing, and not being understood. Well, that's sort of a "stacked" question, but I'll attempt to answer it anyway. See, by saying "hasn't been quantified yet", it suggests both that the being is likely to exist, and that our god-detection methods aren't capable of detecting gods. Which, of course, lends itself directly to saying "well, anything you say regarding deities is based on our current methods and philosophies regarding gods, which we already agreed are incomplete".
     So, I would request to drop "just hasn't been quantified yet" from the statement, in the interest of fairness.

That, also, being said, we can look at the possibility of a deity. First off, I assume you are not talking about an animistic deity, or a religion anthropomorphing a deity-like object, such as celestial objects or weather phenomona. If this assumption is false, than I would agree that it is not only possible that these deities exist, but would say that they most definately do exist, as the object itself exists, and the folklore and concepts surrounding it deifies it to us, making the question of it's actual sentience irrelevant. People, in other words, would still worship these deities even if it were proven that they were not actually sentient or acting out their wills upon us, just based on the folklore surrounding them, although a case can be made for them worshipping the folklore, and not the actual objects.

However, I think it's more likely that you were talking about an omnipotent, omniscient entity, capable of matter creation, that interacts with us. This concept of a deity, after all, seems to be the most popular currently.

Since we cannot really discuss the existance of omnipotence, omniscience, or matter creation, as none of these things can neither be demonstrated in any algebraic form nor retain any meaning within the systems that comprise them, we're left with interaction. Any type of interaction is understandable. Furthermore, an omniscient being that was interacting with us would be more than capable of proving information in forms we could understand.

Which leads to your second example. The problem with it is that it's entirely emotion-based, which is why it's not verifiable. That's not saying that "it's not a possible explanation of these feelings", rather, that's saying "any explanation for these feelings is as meaningless to reality as any abstract concept, as the feelings themselves are abstract concepts and it is impossible to determine their origin", or more simply, "since you don't know what causes these feelings, saying deities cause them is as meaningless as saying leprechauns cause them".