An all-knowing/omniscient god would know what it takes to convince me!

[Pavlos Maros]

Hi everybody, as you all know I am not convinced a god exists.

Now if you haven't seen this before "An all-knowing/omniscient god would know what it takes to convince me!" This is what the thread is about.

However, here is where my problem lies, I know my own mind. And I know that I could never be truly convinced that a god exists because. 1, I could never be sure it wasn't an advanced alien with an agenda or 2, I can't travel the entire universe to search under every nook and grannie to look for it. The former is what I'm really interested in your opinion for.

Is my logic flawed, in thinking that if a god was able to convince me, then I would not be the same person. I was before I was "convinced".
If an omniscient being knows how to convince me. Then it knows my mind better than I. It also knows that I would question it. But if I become convinced I can't be considered me anymore, because it has deliberately changed my mind for me.
What do you think, it might be a moot question to a group of theist, but it would be nice to get your perspective on it? Just the same. And any other atheists or agnostics here too.

 

[Waterfall]

I've stayed "me" after others have changed my mind, I just became a better me sometimes because of it.

 

[Mendalla]

An omniscient deity might know what it takes to convince you, but they still might have to convince you. To literally change your mind by rearranging your neurons or something, they would also have to be omnipotent.

A deity with omniscience but limited omnipotence (e.g. as postulated in open or process theology), could only try to "lure" you or change your opinion, not actually change you in a literal way. So would still be you, just holding some different opinions. No different than if you started voting for a different political party or changed your vote on Brexit.

Now, in the case of a deity with true omnipotence, e.g. the classical God of Western monotheism, they could, in fact, change you literally by messing around with your neurons or something. They may choose not to for reasons, but they technically could in which case, yeah, you would be a different person in a sense.

 

[Pavlos Maros]

I've stayed "me" after others have changed my mind, I just became a better me sometimes because of it.

Thanks Waterfall. But that was other humans. I'm asking about a god.

 

[Pavlos Maros]

An omniscient deity might know what it takes to convince you, but they still might have to convince you. To literally change your mind by rearranging your neurons or something, they would also have to be omnipotent.

A deity with omniscience but limited omnipotence (e.g. as postulated in open or process theology), could only try to "lure" you or change your opinion, not actually change you in a literal way. So would still be you, just holding some different opinions. No different than if you started voting for a different political party or changed your vote on Brexit.

Now, in the case of a deity with true omnipotence, e.g. the classical God of Western monotheism, they could, in fact, change you literally by messing around with your neurons or something. They may choose not to for reasons, but they technically could in which case, yeah, you would be a different person in a sense.

Mendalla, In your second paragraph. This is where I find the OP title to be confusing because if it were open to debate, with me and a creature claiming it was a god. I could not be convinced.
I was told by some friends that I wasn't looking at this logically. And I cant see how.

 

[unsafe]

Thread title ------

An all-knowing/omniscient god would know what it takes to convince me!​

I say ----an all knowing God out of His Love --Grace and Mercy gives us Free will to decide if we want to be convinced that He exists ----If you have decided there is no God ---then you are exercising your free choice that God has given you ------whether you believe that or not -----God doesn't need you or anyone to believe or be convinced that He exists -----and Satan is hoping that you stay unconvinced that is what he is here for --to keep you and as many as he can from seeing the light in his darkness --

So stay unconvinced and hope your right in your end of life -----

Science has not proven there is life on other planets or gods on other planets ----and the spaceship theory and aliens is all speculation not proven either but many believe that there is life on other planets and aliens exists because they have the free will to choose to believe that ------

So you are what you want and choose to believe ------but God says very plainly that is is no excuse not to be convinced that He exists ----name other planets that Science has proven that there is trees ---flowers ---plants --animals ---birds ----sea life -----humans ---houses or huts ----stores to shop in ----hospitals for the sick etc -----

God does not need you or anyone to believe in Him -----He really doesn't care cause you have free choice ---you either believe in Him or you don't ----your choice -----the rubber meets the road when you die -----as just because you want to be unconvinced that God does exist you will have no say when you do die and end up finding out that He did exist ------and you were fooled all along -----

While you keep telling everyone their claims are unsupported ----yours are just as unsupported -----you will know the Truth when you die -----and that is the real Truth -----

Here is the thing ----with people who are true believers ---if heaven and hell do not exist ---then the true believers has lost nothing when they die by believing in this life that these places do exist -------but if unbelievers believe that heaven and hell don't exist in this life when they die and find out that these places do exist then they have lost there eternal life forever ------so we make the free choice here and hope we are right in our choice when we die -----

 

[Luce NDs]

Mendalla, In your second paragraph. This is where I find the OP title to be confusing because if it were open to debate, with me and a creature claiming it was a god. I could not be convinced.
I was told by some friends that I wasn't looking at this logically. And I cant see how.

This is why I find God a humorous concept that can flip from darker to light attributes in a flash of power that is mostly emotional in nature and therefore irrational about where this entity appears. If God is all over the place with the distributed points of the supposed entity ... that appears as a devoid spirit ... would this approach quantum nature by chance?

Imagine there particles travelling at high speed to places beyond where we could go ... and thus paralleling an attribute that would simulate an excites solar wind. This seems to incarnate in an appearance that would be gone as fast as it appeared to be and then wasn't. Would these motions poke holes in the densest material like the mortal mind that has collapsed under the gravid powers? During these periods without thought ... some conception could be occasioned. Perhaps the reason a mythical (dark) power pulls the veil down in order to make copies ... through despised gathering and coupling ... thus allowing copulation as a word to describe a pair losing cognizance for an instance to trade information of the small genetic nature ... at least for a wittle bit!

Sometimes the generated matter may appear as a bright spot in an otherwise dull life ... yet some material substance is required to cultivate, feed, shelter clothe, educate and heal the little blot from the hatred they absorb by exposure to life that is said by some to be driven by the gods of war as a bloody society!

Beyond this dark expanse, where we don't get far, because of avarice in high places there may be an underlying rational ... the devil to those supporting a dense God as they believe they have collected and gathered all on their own power ... even though power is corruptive without Q loose being loose!

The rich, obviously though omnipotent illumination, resist sharing wealth so they can blast off into outer space before the hated demons that appear amongst the demos ... and thus shaking up those desiring to be emperor ... in a turbulent matter that could shake the entire mud ball ... thus dirt storms appear in clear skies. However in the abstract case all the non existent may counter the existential ... supporting doubts that shadow both poles in the bipolar attributes of some personalities.

We cannot study this as it appears it could be something of a far out imaginary cognizance ... way beyond our present knowledge ... difficult as the masses are taught to respect presence only and deny history or any schemes (conspiracy) to alter the eternal outcome ... which seems a closed case that we can't see from present perspectives ... indicating that there may be more to come ... of the same ... and why far out archetypes would allow us to fall out of the future as a lesson on the pain of intellectual time travel ... a ghostly cognizance of goth! Goth being said to be a dark shadow as mysterious consequence!

Expect this may have passed without note ...

 

[BetteTheRed]

This is where I find the OP title to be confusing because if it were open to debate, with me and a creature claiming it was a god. I could not be convinced.

There's always the possibility that Godde knows that, and so doesn't bother with you.

 

[Mendalla]

I think the whole problem from my standpoint as a philosophical agnostic (belief in God is a matter of subjective belief/faith, not empirical or rational proof) is that I am not entirely sure what would convince me. Not reading the Bible and listening to rants from the faithful. I've done both of those aplenty and remain unconvinced. Ditto apologetics like Lewis or Francis Collins (good as Collins' book on the subject is). Given my philosophical position, I know that it is not a proof that will do it. It would have to be some kind of profound spiritual experience that I could not explain away rationally or empirically. But I have no real idea in my head what that might look like. Experiences that others have claimed as "from God" like moments of awe in nature don't register that way for me.

 

[Luce NDs]

I think the whole problem from my standpoint as a philosophical agnostic (belief in God is a matter of subjective belief/faith, not empirical or rational proof) is that I am not entirely sure what would convince me. Not reading the Bible and listening to rants from the faithful. I've done both of those aplenty and remain unconvinced. Ditto apologetics like Lewis or Francis Collins (good as Collins' book on the subject is). Given my philosophical position, I know that it is not a proof that will do it. It would have to be some kind of profound spiritual experience that I could not explain away rationally or empirically. But I have no real idea in my head what that might look like. Experiences that others have claimed as "from God" like moments of awe in nature don't register that way for me.

Sounds like Uncertainty Prin. personified!

This is a principle not well received by the determined personality! Some investigation of Xenon words required as portion of the alien tongues syndrome!

This may include syncretic myths ...

 

[Waterfall]

Thanks Waterfall. But that was other humans. I'm asking about a god.

I was including God.....when God enters into ones life it changes us. God can be within us and outside of us. Its possible a blind person could see God and a deaf person could hear God. Its a spiritual experience.

 

[GeoFee]

However, here is where my problem lies, I know my own mind. And I know that I could never be truly convinced that a god exists because. 1, I could never be sure it wasn't an advanced alien with an agenda or 2, I can't travel the entire universe to search under every nook and grannie to look for it. The former is what I'm really interested in your opinion for.

God is the source of my being present. Put another way, I am a part of the whole. I emerged from that whole and one day I will return to that whole. Whole understood as the totality of the material cosmos. I, like the cosmos of which I am a part, am comprised of electrons, protons and neutrons.

What I find most intriguing, regarding my presence in the cosmos, is the consciousness which allows me to stand in a subjective relationship to objective reality.

 

[Waterfall]

There's always the possibility that Godde knows that, and so doesn't bother with you.

Well i don't know about that, Pavlos is asking some interesting questions.

 

[Mendalla]

God is the source of my being present. Put another way, I am a part of the whole. I emerged from that whole and one day I will return to that whole. Whole understood as the totality of the material cosmos. I, like the cosmos of which I am a part, am comprised of electrons, protons and neutrons.

What I find most intriguing, regarding my presence in the cosmos, is the consciousness which allows me to stand in a subjective relationship to objective reality.

I am much the same, but I do not attach the name/title "God" to it. Maybe it is my upbringing, but God, to me, must somehow transcend the Cosmos. The closest I come to that is a sense, at times, that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

 

[GeoFee]

I use the word God in various contexts. My inner language has no need of the word God. Like Moses, and others, I am led only by the name “I am who I am becoming”.

 

[Northwind]

This is an excellent topic. I've often thought that if god were omnipotent and omnipresent, then god would ______ (fill in the blank). The blank depends on what happens to pop into my brain.

This is good food for thought.

 

[GeoFee]

Yum. Yum.

 

[Kimmio Laughterlove]

Hi everybody, as you all know I am not convinced a god exists.

Now if you haven't seen this before "An all-knowing/omniscient god would know what it takes to convince me!" This is what the thread is about.

However, here is where my problem lies, I know my own mind. And I know that I could never be truly convinced that a god exists because. 1, I could never be sure it wasn't an advanced alien with an agenda or 2, I can't travel the entire universe to search under every nook and grannie to look for it. The former is what I'm really interested in your opinion for.

Is my logic flawed, in thinking that if a god was able to convince me, then I would not be the same person. I was before I was "convinced".
If an omniscient being knows how to convince me. Then it knows my mind better than I. It also knows that I would question it. But if I become convinced I can't be considered me anymore, because it has deliberately changed my mind for me.
What do you think, it might be a moot question to a group of theist, but it would be nice to get your perspective on it? Just the same. And any other atheists or agnostics here too.

Once I became convinced it changed me. I'm still me, but with a different awareness of being part of something greater than me. In that sense it changed my relationship to the world around me and how I think of it. A whole being greater than the sum of its parts feeling, like Mendalla mentioned. Also, a reason for being here - feeling like part of a greater collective consciousness, or subconscious that changes our how we experience the world. It's not apart from ourselves but we play a conscious or unconscious role in it.

I find when coincidences happen...like the other day when unsafe brought up Nick (forget how to spell his last name), a disabled man without limbs, who goes on inspirational tours to preach to people...I had thought of him a day or two before, out of the blue, hadn't read about him in years. It was in the context of a different conversation I wanted to have with my family. I could just take that as an eerie coincidence that means nothing, or as the collective consciousness and conscience that is God, that I am a part of, giving me a message. Not a direct message from a man in the sky or voices in my head telling me something - but the sense that there's a reason why that persons name surfaced through the web of consciousness, and into my life at this time. There's probably a scientific explaination that involves quantum physics but we don't have a clear one - yet, I think it's more than coincidence, there's personally something to be learned when we have those little breakthrough experiences. And I find those kinds of coincidences happened more often, or I didn't ignore them as readily, once I became convinced there's a God.

 

[Ritafee]

It's all a word game of hiding and seeking.

Is being the seeker or is being the finder all that one can become?

It's only words ... spirited though they may be.

 

[ninj]

What kind of lens are we looking through? IMO it's always that of our species, and it's attendant limitations. And not all "truths" can be apprehended by humans. Plus, we get to determine all the parameters and define all the terms. Is that fair?