Does God need to be concious?

Okay that is fine, but this would mean that god can not also be all powerful then. Why?

Because a law is static, it has parameters in which it can or can not do something. Therefore if god was a law then god would be limited to that law. You can't pick and chose and say well god is the law in which it can do what ever it wants without restrictions. That isn't a law then, it would have to mind it's "what ever it wants".

Are you sure you want god to be a law now?

Does wind 'need' to blow?
Does a vaccuum 'need' to suck?
What kind of pathetic anthropomorphic 'god' has 'needs'.
God is Consciousness/Mind.
Of course, god is whatever you think It is, as we are the only way that Consciousness can 'perceive' itself (Mind).

- God cannot know himself without me. - Meister Eckhart

Yes, YHWH needs to be conscious, and even more, have such a degree of conscious that consciousness is achieved. That's what his creators have stipulated.

I know it sounds rediculous but God doesnt have to be concious or unconcious. God just is.

God doesnt have to act rationally in order to be reasonable. God is within the universe, God is the universe, and God is distinct from the universe. What makes people think that God has to abide by our logic and not some type of "divine logic".

If God has divine logic, then all intellectual philisophical arguments concerning God are meaningless. It is what it is.

Can't go wrong with Pascals Wager.

Yes you can;

Pascal's wager

"While men are gazing up to Heaven, imagining after a happiness, or fearing a Hell after they are dead, their eyes are put out, that they see not what is their birthright." -- Gerrard Winstanley, The Law of Freedom, 1652

BackgroundRefutation

Missing possibilities
The main problem with Pascal's wager is that it suffers from the fallacy of bifurcation. It only calculates with two options when there are, in fact, at least four alternatives: The christian God and afterlife, some other god and afterlife, atheism with afterlife, and atheism without afterlife. Therefore Pascal's wager is invalid as an argument.

Avoiding the wrong hell problem
Because of the multitude of possible religions, if any faith is as likely as the other, the probability of the christian being right is P=1/n where n is the number of possible faiths. If we assume that there is an infinite amount of possible gods (i.e. ideas of gods), the probability of you being right is infinitely small.

Because Pascal's wager fails to tell us which god is likely to be the right one, you have a great probability that you picked the wrong religion and go to some other religion's version of hell. This is referred to as the "avoiding the wrong hell problem"

Worse hells and greater heavens
Pascal's wager is the product of the gain from a certain belief and the probability that it is the correct one (in Pascal's reasoning 50-50, but as mentioned above the probability is much less.) such as Win=Gain*P. This leads us to the conclusion that we should pick the religion with the worst hell and the greatest heaven. In that case we should chose to worship the Invisible Pink Unicorns (IPU) because they have an infinite bad hell and an infinitely wonderful heaven, unless, of course we can show that the probability of the existance of an IPU is exactly zero, i.e. you can prove for certainity that they don't exist. If it is only close to zero we still have infinite gain/loss since infinity times any positive value is still infinity.

Atheist alternatives
The argument is based on the false assumption that atheists don't gain anything efter they die. Most atheists don't believe that they do, but there are other possibilities than just going to heaven vs ceasing to exist, such as progression to a better plane, or hanging around as ghosts. Neither of those require the existance of gods to be possibilities.

Detesting life?
An example of a widespread atheist view on life after death is the Buddist belief in reincarnation. Personally I would suggest that this is the bet that gets the most gain, since it lets you play again, and again, and again... for eternity.

Theists may say that the gain from heaven is greater than the gain from life on earth, so their faith is a better bet than belief in reincarnation. But they miss the point that living for eternity will give you infinite gain as long as the gain is positive, because infinity times any positive number is still infinity. Even infinity times infinity is still infinity, so the only possibility that would give theists better gain than Buddists is if the gain from life on earth is negative or exactly zero. Therefore you have to detest life and the world for the argument to be valid.

Blasphemy worse than un-belief
Believing in the wrong god has one additional problem. Most religions assure you that blasphemers will be more severely punished than un-believers. Once again, if we calculate with the rest of the possible gods, the chance of you being wrong is P=1-(1/n) so you both run a bigger risk than the atheist of being punished and risk the greater punishment.

The loss from religion
Pascal also made the incorrect statement that you would lose nothing from believing if you are wrong. This is not true either. Assume that you are wrong in being a theist. You will waste a lot of time and energy on going to church, praying and religious rituals. Imagine if all the energy that,throughout human history, had been wasted on such activities had been used to improve the world instead. Then maybe we would have had heaven here on earth instead.

Imagine if all that energy had been used for science, arts and music. OK, there have been many christians who have devoted their life to that, but imagine how wonderful things they would have been able to do if they hadn't wasted their time on prayers and rituals. Imagine what Pascal could have done for mathematics and physics if he hadn't left science for God.

Considering what religious belief has done to the world, it would be better if there was no religion. Religion is like a virus that changes people's minds into dogmatic thinking, rule following, and blind faith, qualities which do no good for the well-being of mankind. Consider how many people who have been burned, mutilated and tortured in the name of religion. Wouldn't it be better if we left the Dark Ages for once!?

Believing what is probable
The process of belief is not a bet, not based on hope for reward or fear of punishment. Normally you believe in something your sences tells you is likely to be true. No intelligent person would be convinced that god exists from Pascal's wager, and I question that this argument really was the reason why a genious like Pascal believed in god. I rather see it that he had lost the basis for his faith and that Pascal's wager was the last thread to keep him hanging on to christianity.

Argument for theists only
Pascal thought that theism and atheism were equally likely - that is, we cannot know which of the philosophies is correct. This is non-information, and, according to information theory, it is impossible to get information from non-information without any cost. Therefore it is impossible to conclude, from the assumption, that theists will gain more than atheists and the statement that if god exists you gain from believing in him must also be an assumption - not a conclusion. So what Pascal's wager basically says that "If you believe in God, you will believe that you gain from worshipping him". Not a very convincing argument for atheists.

God rewarding only true believers
The christian god is supposed to be omnipotent. If so, he will know who are the true believers and who worship him only to be on the safe side. Therefore it is not likely that a person who worships God because of Pascal's wager will go to heaven. This is sometimes called the Atheist version of Pasca'sl wager, since it says atheists will be better rewarded than theist hypocrites, and thus if you do not believe in god, you shouldn't lie and say you do.

Is god just?
Now if there is a god, and he is just, he would not send kind atheists to hell only because they can't believe in him. A just god judges people for who they are, not for what their minds tell them is likely to be true or not. Therefore a just god would still save atheists if they were good people.

Like someone once said, "I would love to go to hell and meet people such as Einstein, Darwin, Russell and Voltaire." Is it really likely that these people were sent to hell, only because their great minds didn't find any evidence of the Christian god? In that case the word "just" is not applieable to god, and such a god is not even worth worshipping. To worship such a god would be like worshiping your worst enemy because you were afraid of his revenge if you didn't submit to his power.

Theists being punished for their sins.
I don't think there is an agenda in christianity that you are being rewarded for mere worshipping god. I think it is far more common among theists to believe that god rewards you for what you really are. In other words, God won't reward you for helping people if you do it only to please God, but he will if you do it out of compassion. Therefore it is quite likely that false people, who only worship god because they fear hell, or because they think it is the bet that gives the most gain, will go to hell. So believing in god and being a bad person will be as bad as being an atheist, if not worse because God mightn't like being surrounded for eternity by cringing hypocrites.

Economics

nameless, thanks for this outline, I feel there is one part missing...

We have a possible life span of a hundred years or so, lets just assume one hundred. Even if it were less it doesn't really matter for this next argument.

Compared to eternity a hundred year life span is quicker than the blink of an eye. Our life time is so incredibly short compared to infinity that it really comes down to this.

Do you love me, yes or no?

As soon as you answer the question you are tossed into one or the other pile. Meaning heaven or hell. Your life really didn't matter to god because it's over so quickly. None of your actions matter either since it comes down to love or not.

If this is how god operates, then there is absolutely no compassion nor respect for beings and on top of that, when you are given life, did you have a choice in that?

So before you existed were you given the choice to exist to play gods little game of love or no love? This is my little addition. How can you honestly say this is a fair opportunity if you never wanted to play the game in the first place?

So pascal can take his wager and shove it up his ass... because who says you need to play the game? A person not wanting to lose anything, sometimes not playing is a safer bet.

god is imagined probably every way possible... a little bit different among each person...

whys it matter... why need to give a gender, name, title, face, entity, preferences, personality.... thats not fair... you just need to admit its unknowable... and act in a fair empathetic manner not for reward or punishment, but for the fact you know its the right thing to do....

ive been hearin alot of claims that God is numbers.... vibrations... ive always tended to think it was consciousness... but unconscious things LIVE too... so it must be a bit further than that...

I don't 'want' god to be anything; I want to know what god IS. My point is that the assumption that god should be coscious is unjustified.

Lets start with Aquinas, he argued that God makes no choices and cannot think. This is becaise choice involves contingecy of ideas whereas God is simple (so His ideas ARE himself) and necessary (so no contingent) and thought involved motion through ideas but God has no potentiality at all.
-- so is the Catholic notion of a timeless, simple God conscious or just a force/reality. I would argue that the catholic notion of God is closer to a force/reality on which all things else act in respect to.
- in this Catholic notion of God, He is still omnipotent because the entire world depends on Him. So God's behaviour, while powerful, is ironically limited by His own nature e.g. God CANNOT make an elephant pop into my house right now because that would contradict His own laws of nature, God CANNOT will harm on people, God CANNOT move etc etc etc
-- god can't do much in Catholicism actually....


So I guess this topic should be about evaluting the Catholic 'god'

How do we not "play the game" once we know about Gods existence? The concept of religion is a tough thing to repress when your a part of a society. Once we know about the concept of God, we have to make a choice. Either we choose God exists or God doesnt exists. I feel like alot of people think of agnosticism as a loophole out of this "religion trap", but what it really is is just a politically correct term for atheist. Maybe I'm wrong. In fact, I hope I'm wrong.

I'm not trying to upset anyone. I just want to understand.


Nameless, thanks for that information. I never thought about that. I guess Pascals wager isn't to good of an arguement.

Can we literally apply labels like "conscious" to God at all?

Obviously you've never read the bible or been to a mass.
Your 'simple force' sends people to hell, punishes, rewards, angers, is jealous, sad, regretful, the author of 'evil' and 'lies', petulant, genocidal, murderous, happy, insane, loving, misanthropic, misogynist,... the (so called) 'god' of the bible is completely anthropomorphic +1.


Of course!, look at all the 'labels' above, and that's just the Xtian 'view'.
No mystic would make that error, as his experience/understanding is not egoic speculation, as in the bible.

On the other hand, as Meister Eckhart said; "God cannot know himself without me." And ALL Perspectives, collectively, no matter how childish and inane, are 'features', just as a complete definition of 'me' (or you) must incorporate every Perspective of me, what everyone (including myself) that 'sees'/knows me thinks, sees, conceives, believes, perceives, etc... about me. I am the sum-total of Perspectives, as is the Universe, as is 'god's/Consciousness'' 'self awareness'.

I've been a Roman Catholic for 17 years (until leaving recently) and studies the entire Bible, read theology works, and read the Catechism of the Catholic church front to back twice. I've been to thousands of masses.

God may be depicted as anthropomorphic - but if you refuse to differentiate between religious imagery and religious realism then this discussion would go nowhere at all.
God, in Catholicism, DOES NOT get happy or angry or feel any emotions at all. God is immutable and is not contingent in any way (so nothing could affect Him emotionally) ;and since He has no parts, He has no emotions since an emotion is a contingent predicate of something - since God is neither contingence, can be really predicated or is not even a thing it follows that God has no emotions except 'feeling God-like'

If so, and you were awake and understood anything, you wouldn't have made such an erroneous assertion.


I do. There is no difference. All that the bible presents is what I have posted. The bible does not support your assertion. Simple.
Religious realism? Oxymoronic at best!


Shall I 'mine' the Catholic bible for the myriad quotes that support what I have posted? I surely wouldn't need to if you were actually familiar with the book.
Didn't traditional Catholicism discourage the sheeple from reading the bible for themselves? From coming to their own thoughtful interpretations? Had to depend on the priests for all reading and interpretation? Control?


All from your head. I might even agree, but we are talking about the 'god' that comes slithering from the bible.
I don't think you want to compare quotes.
The 'god' of the bible is the most contrived, speculated, anthropomorphic 'creation in man's image' that man has ever created, of any so called scripture extant.
So, you don't think that It's 'loving' either? *__-

What I mean by not playing is that you didn't have the choice to live or not live to start with. You are therefore FORCED to play the love god game.

I see it like this, a person walks up to you with a loaded gun in their hand and says love me or die. Some Christians through this fear will submit and say they love god but in actuality they don't really love god at all, they just fear the consequences. There are some who do love god with or without consequences but they are a rare breed and typically they are more fanatical and mean to other people because of it.


Well hell you could have solved this problem in less than a minute if you had cracked open a dictionary or better yet search engine a dictionary and typed in agnostic and or atheist.

But I'll point it out here for you since maybe you are just lazy?

Atheist don't believe in god.

Agnostics say there is not enough evidence to make a decision. In other words knowledge is lacking in their opinion.

The atheist doesn't even consider if god could exist, they simply say, "God doesn't exist".

The agnostic will say, "Well god could exist, but we have no way of knowing if god does exist."

The agnostic is not trying to win any game here or be politically correct or trying to play both sides of the issue. The agnostic is just trying to make a statement about not having all the information to make an honest decision. Sort of like the jury is out on deliberation and the verdict is inconclusive.

The atheist has already come to a verdict of a unanimous decision of guilty, god does not exist.

Here is something that will probably make your head spin, I am an agnostic atheist.

Can we literally apply labels like consciousness to God without being in error?



As if, somehow, mysticism is not supported by the Bible, as if, somehow, Christians have not been mystics :rolleyes:

Of course not. Any 'label' is merely 'indicative' (there can be no description/definition) of the ineffable.
As far as I can see, there is not anything that can be taken literally (and, no, not even this sentence!).
I find that the 'Consciousness' 'discovered' by QM (to be "the Ground of All Being") is what I 'understand' as the 'god' of the mystics, and with considerately less baggage than the term 'god', and thus more 'clear'.
And thus, a coincidence between science and mysticism, finally. QM discovers 'god'. What point in history!


(I use 'mystic' as in a successful mystic, rather than a practicing one...)
Anything can be supported by the bible, but I'm sure that you already know that... (rolls eyes right back atcha!)
Any true 'Xtian' mystic would refuse and deny the 'god' of the bible, and most of the rest of the book, nay, must refuse Xtianity itself.

If 'mystics' had written the bible, it's pathological monster god would never have existed. Nor would the majority of much of such uninspired writings.
The 'god' of the bible is no more than a reflection of the vanity of man... a complete anthropomorphisation, a "book of Pride", a "Book of the Dead"!

Then you will have to explain to me how we end up with people such as Thomas Merton.



Why not? If we understand the texts to be metaphorical, to be pointing toward God, I fail to see how even the God of the Old Testament is contrary to mystic nature.

Recall the variety of interpretations. Some Gnostics took the OT Yahweh to be the demiurge, an imperfect emanation of the true God. These Gnostics seem to have been mystics.



I am not sure how you could possibly know whether or not the texts were uninspired.



God is anthropomorphized in the Bible - but we have already agreed that descriptions of God are either figurative or bogus. So, I fail to see why there is a categorical rejection of figurative language of God, such as his anthropomorphism, given that we understand this to be okay.

Please justify this statement.

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Please feel free to offer a thoughtful interpretation of the Bible now that you have full control over your own spiritual faculties ...

Sorry, I would have to be much more familiar with his Perspective before I can consider him a (real mystic). Mystics understand that all is one. That 'god' is ineffable and has no qualities or boundaries. No characteristics. Is this what he has found? Has he rejected the notion of the trinity or made excuses?

The 'laity' will accept anything on 'authority', I will not.
Further, remember what I said about taking everything too literally, especially my sometimes hyperbolic dramatically presented points. But you can't just dump an accepted name and expect me to accept. Go ahead and answer my questions, and, perhaps, I'll give you one. The exception might still prove the rule? How many Xtian mystics over the last two millennia as compared to, oh, say... Hindu? Islamic Sufis? Indigenous shamans? Damn small, the laity is quite uncomfortable with such 'heretics'.
But, just so we don't have to waste any more time on this, I'll give you one. But, I feel that I am being most generous.

"Be good, keep your feet dry, your eyes open, your heart at peace and your soul in the joy of Christ."
Thomas Merton

Unimpressed.


Because the 'god' of thre old testament, or even the new is a god of qualities. The qualities are clearly and carefully delineated. Those specific qualities are not metaphor for 'ineffability' for 'no qualities'. In contrast is the Sikh scripture that can only say what qualities god has not, as he has none. It isn't difficult for one that is not vainly imagining a 'god' in the ego-mirror.


Without any data, I would be merely speculating that a) Gnosticism is not Catholicism (ask the pope what he thinks of Gnosticism) and b) the ratio of Gnostic mystics could well be very similar to the ratio of Xtian mystics.
And odly enough, it seems that the true mystical experience is amazingly similar, no matter the particular spoke of the wheel upon which one treads.


Oh, some things are quite obvious to anyone. If I asked you, could you not pull out some quotes that you find obviously 'less than universally true'? Rabbits, for instance don't chew their cud and 'god' doesn't hate or love, we do. The anthropomorphic descriptions, anger, hate, love and genocidal fits-of-pique of the bible god are far from inspired of mystical understanding/knowledge.


Because the description of god in the bible is not 'figurative, it's bogus, uninspired.
Does depend on the Perspective.
It certainly isn't 'bogus', though, to those who worship their own mirror image and comfortably 'externalize' it. Most consider themselves as the 'god' of their world (no matter their oh-so-humble protests); it's vanity, egoic pride. If 'you' believe in 'free-will/choice', then, that would be 'you' (in general).


It is not 'his' anthropomorphism, it is our vanity that we describe, if we are vain enough to even make the attempt at description. The vision through 'vain' eyes does, though, 'spice the pot' a bit. Makes things more 'interesting'.


I never understood that vainly attempting to name the nameless, to vainly attempt to give features to the featureless, is 'okay'.
Religiously speaking, for a moment, vanity/pride is the only 'sin' (yes, there are many forms) and, from that Perspective, is certainly not 'okay'!

We seem to have strayed from the OP, and I'm getting bored with the avenue down which we wandered. If you want to continue, for some reason, perhaps a 'dedicated thread'? But, I'd be happy to agree to have varying Perspectives, and let it go. I'd rather not talk about a 'god' where words are lies and nothing can be 'communicated'. Unlike the paradoxical Xtian 'god'.

Sorry, I would have to be much more familiar with his Perspective before I can consider him a (real mystic). Mystics understand that all is one. That 'god' is ineffable and has no qualities or boundaries. No characteristics. Is this what he has found? Has he rejected the notion of the trinity or made excuses?

The 'laity' will accept anything on 'authority', I will not.
Further, remember what I said about taking everything too literally, especially my sometimes hyperbolic dramatically presented points. But you can't just dump an accepted name and expect me to accept. Go ahead and answer my questions, and, perhaps, I'll give you one. The exception might still prove the rule? How many Xtian mystics over the last two millennia as compared to, oh, say... Hindu? Islamic Sufis? Indigenous shamans? Damn small, the laity is quite uncomfortable with such 'heretics'.
But, just so we don't have to waste any more time on this, I'll give you one. But, I feel that I am being most generous.

"Be good, keep your feet dry, your eyes open, your heart at peace and your soul in the joy of Christ."
Thomas Merton

Unimpressed.


Because the 'god' of thre old testament, or even the new is a god of qualities. The qualities are clearly and carefully delineated. Those specific qualities are not metaphor for 'ineffability' for 'no qualities'. In contrast is the Sikh scripture that can only say what qualities god has not, as he has none. It isn't difficult for one that is not vainly imagining a 'god' in the ego-mirror.


Without any data, I would be merely speculating that a) Gnosticism is not Catholicism (ask the pope what he thinks of Gnosticism) and b) the ratio of Gnostic mystics could well be very similar to the ratio of Xtian mystics.
And odly enough, it seems that the true mystical experience is amazingly similar, no matter the particular spoke of the wheel upon which one treads.


Oh, some things are quite obvious to anyone. If I asked you, could you not pull out some quotes that you find obviously 'less than universally true'? Rabbits, for instance don't chew their cud and 'god' doesn't hate or love, we do. The anthropomorphic descriptions, anger, hate, love and genocidal fits-of-pique of the bible god are far from inspired of mystical understanding/knowledge.


Because the description of god in the bible is not 'figurative, it's bogus, uninspired.
Does depend on the Perspective.
It certainly isn't 'bogus', though, to those who worship their own mirror image and comfortably 'externalize' it. Most consider themselves as the 'god' of their world (no matter their oh-so-humble protests); it's vanity, egoic pride. If 'you' believe in 'free-will/choice', then, that would be 'you' (in general).


It is not 'his' anthropomorphism, it is our vanity that we describe, if we are vain enough to even make the attempt at description. The vision through 'vain' eyes does, though, 'spice the pot' a bit. Makes things more 'interesting'.


I never understood that vainly attempting to name the nameless, to vainly attempt to give features to the featureless, is 'okay'.
Religiously speaking, for a moment, vanity/pride is the only 'sin' (yes, there are many forms) and, from that Perspective, is certainly not 'okay'!

We seem to have strayed from the OP, and I'm getting bored with the avenue down which we wandered. If you want to continue, for some reason, perhaps a 'dedicated thread'? But, I'd be happy to agree to have varying Perspectives, and let it go. I'd rather not talk about a 'god' where words are lies and nothing can be 'communicated'. Unlike the paradoxical Xtian 'god'.

Does God need to be concious?
I say, what kind of 'god' has 'needs'?
The 'god' of the bible!
The 'god' of the mirror!



Does God need to be concious?
I say, what kind of 'god' has 'needs'?
The 'god' of the bible!
The 'god' of the mirror!

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My reference to 'control' was relating to the 'control' of the priest class over the laity.
I don't know what a 'spirit' is, and thus 'spiritual facilities', Doorsopen. Like 'Casper the Friendly Ghost' is a 'spirit'? And where he works out would be a 'spiritual facility'? (see how silly these attempts at sarcasm can be?)
Care to share 'your beliefs'/define 'spirit'?
Actually, I'd rather you didn't, not that I don't appreciate your attempt at sarcasm...
(darn, there I go again!)

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