Does God Really Exist?

I think the proof that God exists lies in the beauty of LOVE and in the miracle of LIFE.

They are things that mankind is not capable of creating on his/her own.

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God transcends space and time. A discussion would involve proofs in space and time. It would be like an ant trying to prove that a man built the porch. So if you are looking for hard physical evidence you will fall short. If you are looking for experiential evidence, that is a personal journey.

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Proof? It depends on the level of proof you are interested in. Any belief in God requires an element of faith. I can prove my desk exists because it takes up physical space and I can use my physical senses to provide data to my brain about its physical properties.

God however, is Spirit. We cannot see Him, touch Him, smell Him, taste him. So He cannot be proved using conventional means. To me, the proof is in our very existence. It is unfathomable to me that life can come from nothing. The universe is too complex to have just happened. The ecosystem of our planet is just too complex to have just happened. So for me, faith in God is only a very small leap. But it does still take faith to believe in Him.

A book I was recently recommended is (I think) "The Case for God" by Lee Strobel. I plan to read it just for questions such as yours. I'm told it is very good and makes a strong case for God for those who are looking for "proof". Not sure if it provides the kind of proof you want. But then again, if anyone could provide definitive, scientific proof of God's existence you would have no need to ask the question and this forum would be somewhat useless. Smile

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God exists, for me, in my heart.

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Well....
In the Beginning...
There are three main "items" that science has a problem with:
The case for the Big Bang;
The case for Life;
And the case for Man...

The Big Bang is relatively simple -
If all the mass/energy in the Universe is condensed into a single point which exploded, then in order for it to explode, you would need the same amount (infinite) of energy from outside the Universe to make it explode.

Call it what you will, the Energy from Outside is necessary for the Big Bang.

Life is similiar -
Mathematically, the DNA chain that is necessary for Life has the probability of existing by random chance something like 62 to the nth power (I am not a mathematician and I'm doing this quickly from memory - given time, I can look it up.) I believe that "statistical impossibility is considered something like 50 to the nth power.
The statistic I do remember is that the odds of Life occuring are the same odds as winning the California State Lottery eight times, consecutively, in a row.
Therefore if that happened, the logical conclusion would be for most rational minds, that the game was fixed.
Ergo, the origins of Life are Fixed by ?

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eoe wrote:

God exists, for me, in my heart.

But that's not proof of his existence!

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I think the National Enquirer has "proven" it many times. They have more qualified reporters. Try searching the Archives!

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Define what you mean by God. Not everyone agrees in their definitions of the term. In any case, first we should like to prove that we exist and that has yet to be done.

I maintain that nothing of the perceptual world exists. The illusion of multiplicity has no more substance than any dream you might have on a warm summer's night. The dream in which perceptual reality exists has no dreamer as an indivdual personality. The Dreamer is God and the dream is infinite without beginning, boundaries, or endings.

The Abrahamic notion of God is to my mind wrong, and such a god is small potatoes indeed. Being finiteand having a "personality", that god is just another fragment of the larger Illusion.

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For someone who denies God, he first must know what or who is God. For example, if someone denied that this thing is a pen, then he must first know what a pen is. He can't say that this thing is not a pen if he doesn't know what a pen is. This is simple logic.
So before someone denies God, he first must know God.

In general, people who deny God are divided into 3 categories:
1- People who say that the Universe created itself
2- People who say that Nature created the Universe
3- People who say that the Universe was created by chance.

All these 3 categories agree that the Universe had a beginning: The Big Bang.

Now the first category who is saying that the Universe created itself fell into a serious contradiction. It's like saying that the Universe existed and didn't exist at the same time. They are saying that the Universe acted one time as a Creator and in another time as a Creation which is impossible since the Universe had a beginning. The Universe can not create itself since it didn't exist before the beginning.

Now the second category who is saying that the Universe was created by nature also fell into another contradiction. The nature is a part of the Universe, and if the Universe can not create itself because it didn't exist before the beginning, then how a part of a CREATED thing can create this thing? Surely this part can't exist if the whole part doesn't exist. So how a part of a CREATED Universe can create the Universe?

The third category who is saying that the Universe was creating by chance also fell into contradiction. Before the beginning, even Chance didn't exist. So how can you create SOMETHING from NOTHING?

Entropy is when a physical energy like electricity is converted into less low disorganized and chaotic quality of energy like heat.
The Universe began with a Chaotic Disorganized status (The Big Bang) and progressed from a disorder condition to an ordered one, and from simpler materials and energy sources into wonderful fascinating complexities. In other word, the Universe has evolved opposing the Entropy. So if Universe existed by itself, or created by Nature, or by chance, it surely would have followed the Entropy basis. But the Universe didn't, HOW?????? WHY?????????????

A CREATOR is perhaps a GOOD Answer.
We call this creator GOD....

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Cyanure,

A First Cause is only applicable to if the universe is finite. If the universe is infinite (without beginning, boundary, or ending), then there is no need for a Creator.

Finite models have alot of messy problems. What came before? No matter what the answer is it generates the same question ad infinitum. How can there be an "outside" to the universe, since the universe by definition is the whole shooting match. If something is identified just outside the boundary, then it becomes a part of the whole.

The notion of a deity who has a personality, who thinks and acts according to some conceptual idea, is a reach. The Abrahamic faiths ascribe to this supernatural being the ability to suspend the physical laws, and to communicate his wishes to humanbeings. There is, to that version of god, a divine plan that is perfect in its conception and certain in its outcome. By way of contrast, certain favored followers are said to have bartered, negotiated with god to change events. Those favored by that god can accurately foretell the future, yet the followers of the Abrahamic god inist that humans have unfettered freewill (a clear contradiction of terms). This is a god that is often depicted as jealous and vengeful, often even against those who transgress his laws unknowingly, or inadvertantly. Many Christians have held that an unbaptised infant who dies is condemend to hell for eternity, while a mass murderer who on his death-bed accepts Christ as a savior will go to heaven.

Isn't this the Creator you would have us believe in?

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Quote:

A First Cause is only applicable to if the universe is finite. If the universe is infinite (without beginning, boundary, or ending), then there is no need for a Creator.

The universe is finite.
It had a beginning (the Big Bang)
It will have an end (the Big crunch or the flat open universe)
If you deny that, you are challenging Stephen Hawking and entropy. :wink:

Quote:

Finite models have alot of messy problems. What came before? No matter what the answer is it generates the same question ad infinitum. How can there be an "outside" to the universe, since the universe by definition is the whole shooting match. If something is identified just outside the boundary, then it becomes a part of the whole.

Andrei Linde, a russian physict, launched the multiuniverse hypothesis theory saying that our Universe is not unique and many other universes exist right now with dimensions exceeding 10.

Quote:

The notion of a deity who has a personality, who thinks and acts according to some conceptual idea, is a reach. The Abrahamic faiths ascribe to this supernatural being the ability to suspend the physical laws, and to communicate his wishes to humanbeings. There is, to that version of god, a divine plan that is perfect in its conception and certain in its outcome. By way of contrast, certain favored followers are said to have bartered, negotiated with god to change events. Those favored by that god can accurately foretell the future, yet the followers of the Abrahamic god inist that humans have unfettered freewill (a clear contradiction of terms). This is a god that is often depicted as jealous and vengeful, often even against those who transgress his laws unknowingly, or inadvertantly. Many Christians have held that an unbaptised infant who dies is condemend to hell for eternity, while a mass murderer who on his death-bed accepts Christ as a savior will go to heaven.

You have a confusion in your ideas here. Some clarification are a must here. I will do it next time. It's 4 AM here and I need to sleep Laughing

God bless

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With all due respect, there is a fourth category, those who care not a damn how we got here, but who wish those who believe in an allegory called GOD or god or g-d or Allah or Shiva or Ganesh or Jesus or the Great Spirit or the hundreds of other names it is called would please stop killing us and each other in any of those names.

Is there love in the world? Can there be peace among humans? Probably not as long as any one set of believers sees any other set of believers as evil, or mis-guided or sub-human. That day will come when all have given up supernaturalism and come to see each other as we are ---Earthlings.

Some of you here know that I write poems and stories about what I see as the human God, that I love the idea that there is a mind that thinks about us in a loving, directed way, and who suffers a bit with us, which is a little odd for a superior being, but for me the greatest irony is that those who proclaim the loudest that their life is directed by a higher power always seem hellbent on missing what is the greatest message of all the beliefs of the world --- that, no matter who the human is or what he believes or doesn't believe, the godhead surrounds him with love and protection, especially from those who would kill him because he speaks to the godhead in a way different from their own.

And to those who those who are about to say, 'yeah but think about all the good believers do'.. I say, do more. As long as there is one life ended in the name of a superior being, it negates all the work of every soup kitchen in every church basement, every spin of every prayer wheel on every mountain, every bell rung, song sung or work done in the name of those who believe in humankind.

Joe Nation

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Cynure,

You are too new here to be aware, but this has been done a number of times in a number of threads. The nature of the universe, time and space, have been especially focused on during the last few months by a number of members. If you would like my views, click on my icon and read the relevant posts on the subject. Once you begin reading the many views expressed, I'm sure you will find clarification.

I'm well aware of scientific views about cosmology. I don't argue that the Big Bang didn't occur, only that it was not "Creation" but rather one event in an infinite chain of cycles, or pulses. That view is not at odds with Hawking, and the universe in that model IS NOT finite, but infinite.

My views are much more in line with Quantum Theory. That there are N-dimensions at the Planck level in no way supports the notion of a finite universe, quite the contrary. It is much more reasonable to believe that the nature of all universes have less to do with substance than with intangibles.

I look forward to hearing how you might go about proving that you, and the Abrahamic God exist. No one has yet been able to establish either, though the evidence against the truth of the Abrahamic religions is legion.

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Does God really exist?

well you believe it then it will appear in your heart.

But WHAT is a GOD?
god, is the thing you needed.------ When you are bored, TV is your god; When you are thirsty, drink is your god; when you are starving, bread is your god; when you are ill, doctor is your god;when you are astray, your teacher is your god; when you are
unhappy, your family is your god;......

So what is your god?

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Victor Murphy wrote:

eoe wrote:
God exists, for me, in my heart.

But that's not proof of his existence!

Yes it is, proof of God, or Higher Intelligence comes only from experience. We can not measure Him, or weigh Him. We know Him by our feelings and intuitions and emotions.

Seventeen years ago I had a near death experience and was in the presence of God, felt His love, caring, and compassion for me. I feel Him with me every day. No, it wasn't an illusion.

I have never doubted since that He exists.

Love

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Hello Asherman
Thanks for the reply

Quote:

I'm well aware of scientific views about cosmology. I don't argue that the Big Bang didn't occur, only that it was not "Creation" but rather one event in an infinite chain of cycles, or pulses.

What makes you so sure about this? Any proofs????

Humans are really strange!!!
They have never seen Gravity, but they believe in it. They just saw a mirror reflection of Gravity when objects fall on the ground!!!

They have never seen Strong Nuclear Force, but they believe in it. They just saw a mirror reflection of Strong Nuclear Force when protons in atom nucleus don't get dispersed!!!

They have never seen Electromagnetic Force, but they believe in it. They just saw a mirror reflection of Electromagnetic Force when electrons remained in the atom orbit!!!

They have never seen a black hole, but they believe in it. They just saw a mirror reflection of Stars vanished in seconds!!!

Humans only see between 400 to 800 nm of the light spectrum, only hear between 20 Hz to 20 KHz, ignore 99.99% of their DNA function, ignore 99% of the universe, get devastated by microorganisms they can't see.... But they insist: why can't we see God?????? Does God exist?

Just as humans believe strongly in mirror reflection of things they haven't seen, then why can't they believe in the Universe wonders, and the complexity of themselves that God has created to be a mirror reflection to His presence??

Humans believe that Nothing can not create Something, but they believe that this Universe was created from Nothing and by Nothing.

Humans do not accept that a book move from the bed room to the living room without a second cause, but they accept that this Universe and themselves were found without a second cause.

Peak of contradictions

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Cyanure wrote:

Hello Asherman
Thanks for the reply

Quote:
I'm well aware of scientific views about cosmology. I don't argue that the Big Bang didn't occur, only that it was not "Creation" but rather one event in an infinite chain of cycles, or pulses.

What makes you so sure about this? Any proofs????

Humans are really strange!!!
They have never seen Gravity, but they believe in it. They just saw a mirror reflection of Gravity when objects fall on the ground!!!

They have never seen Strong Nuclear Force, but they believe in it. They just saw a mirror reflection of Strong Nuclear Force when protons in atom nucleus don't get dispersed!!!

They have never seen Electromagnetic Force, but they believe in it. They just saw a mirror reflection of Electromagnetic Force when electrons remained in the atom orbit!!!

They have never seen a black hole, but they believe in it. They just saw a mirror reflection of Stars vanished in seconds!!!

Humans only see between 400 to 800 nm of the light spectrum, only hear between 20 Hz to 20 KHz, ignore 99.99% of their DNA function, ignore 99% of the universe, get devastated by microorganisms they can't see.... But they insist: why can't we see God?????? Does God exist?

Just as humans believe strongly in mirror reflection of things they haven't seen, then why can't they believe in the Universe wonders, and the complexity of themselves that God has created to be a mirror reflection to His presence??

Humans believe that Nothing can not create Something, but they believe that this Universe was created from Nothing and by Nothing.

Humans do not accept that a book move from the bed room to the living room without a second cause, but they accept that this Universe and themselves were found without a second cause.

Peak of contradictions

Excellent reply! Science is full of contradictions as well as religion. But we fail to see ours, only the other guys. Need more work at finding our own mistakes before we look for the mistakes of others.

Love

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re
The difference being that science is interested in deducing an accurate picture of reality based on the accumulation of knowledge and evidence - and, what's more, testing the evidence in as many ways possible to see how it holds up. It differentiates between mere theory and fact, and is by nature progressive and forward-looking. It's imperfect but it admits this freely and works within the context of those margins.

Religion - generally speaking I suppose, though I'm thinking largely of the Judeo-Christian tradition here - embraces none of these things. It clings to tradition, primitive theories of the past, and vague scripture, merely "updating" itself a little when absolutely forced to once new (scientific) findings that contradict existing elements become irrefutable even to the devout. Way it's always been.

Religion is like a stubborn dog being dragged for a walk it doesn't want to go on by Science, which holds the leash. The dog keeps yapping and insisting it's actually entirely free and that Science just THINKS it's guiding the dog, but that the dog is actually navigating itself with autonomy. Ridiculous. Science is genuinely curious, discovers, and moves forward -- Religion scrambles to catch up with some vague new set of self-abstractions, lest it be left behind all together.

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God however, is Spirit. We cannot see Him, touch Him, smell Him, taste him. So He cannot be proved using conventional means. To me, the proof is in our very existence. It is unfathomable to me that life can come from nothing. The universe is too complex to have just happened. The ecosystem of our planet is just too complex to have just happened. So for me, faith in God is only a very small leap. But it does still take faith to believe in Him.

This is a very silly argument. It is unfathomable to you that life came from nothing, but it's perfectly reasonably for you to assume that some Awesome Creative Being who could author it came from nothing? I think that sounds "too complex to have just happened."

Faith in God is a small leap, but an entirely meaningless one. You don't even understand what God "is." You can't. I can't. By nature, it is a concept that is so far outside of our intellectual field of vision as to be nonsensical. Reality Is. That's all we know. We don't understand why. Pretend a loving Father Figure who thinks you're really special made it if you want to, just so we could all love each other even while we suffer abysmally from all kinds of horrible diseases and disasters and then go to heaven and be happy forever and ever! It's a quaint little story. Uncertainty makes people afraid so they'd rather cling to relics and vague "feelings" (oo I almost died and I felt euphoric as EVERYBODY who almost dies does, probably because some chemical is being released and flushing out the brain or something else that makes a lick of sense as opposed to GASP! I'm meeting GOD!) - rather than accept the truth: You don't know if God exists. If reality as WE know it is authored by higher powers, you've no idea what they themselves are beholden to or where they came from or anything else of substance about them/Him/Her/It. The faith of the "devout" is, well, cute, much as children's belief in Santa Claus (and all their theories about him) is cute -- but it doesn't mean anything; it's just an intellectual stubbornness that apparently helps you get through the day. If anything approximately what we call God does exist, It's so far outside of the realm of our understanding that there's no point theorizing about what it "wants" or has planned or "thinks" about us or whatever else. That's just politics.

(Shrug.) My two cents.

K.

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