Do you believe in God?

[ShatteredDiamond She/Her]

On 4/20/2025 at 7:52 AM, Gary said:

Good and evil are both abstract concepts, neither exist in reality.  A crocodile kills and eats a child who came to the river for a drink of water, is that evil or is it just a crocodile being a crocodile?  You may judge it as evil, but would you say it was evil if instead of a child the crocodile had killed and eaten a zebra? I would say not evil, the crocodile considered the child only as prey and he was hungry.  It is not the act that is evil, but the motive which caused the act.  A man sees a child alone by the river,  He takes the child and kills it just for the pleasure he gets from killing another human, to me this would be evil because of the motive.  Evil is only in the minds of human being and no other animal.

I agree with this... sort of. Humans are the only animal capable of being truly evil because we have agency, conscience, and the ability to reason and predict the consequences of our actions. But some actions are just inherently evil, regardless of how the perpetrator views it. The malicious and selfishly-motivated ending of another persons life would fall into that category.

I also believe that God isn't theoretical - He is a real being who organized the universe.

Edited May 6, 2025 by ShatteredDiamond

[ParaTulip fae/faer (declines as she/her)]

On 5/6/2025 at 10:57 AM, ShatteredDiamond said:

Humans are the only animal capable of being truly evil because we have agency, conscience, and the ability to reason and predict the consequences of our actions.

Why do you suppose only humans have these traits? 

I can agree that humans have the most elaborate social systems of any animal, but how does a bird not exhibit agency when it flies a certain way or sings at a certain point in time? This notion smacks of Descartes' thought that everything that can't engage in Philosophy lacks a soul. This idea wasn't even wholly convincing to people contemporary to Descartes, and I think we mostly carry it forward because it soothes the discomfort industrial animal agriculture gives people.

As for the ability for predict the outcomes of actions, doesn't a crow dropping a nut on a road to get cars to crack it demonstrate a certain sophisticated ability to anticipate the outcomes of its actions? Or any animal which can be trained to engage in complex behaviors must be able to predict the outcome of a reward.

Finally, the notion of the conscious is something I am going to have to ask you to explain as a distinct notion apart from our capacity to form complex social organizations. What is it exactly? I can hardly imagine such a thing that is not able to be seen as a synonym for herd/pack/colony behavior patterns seen in other animals, an instinct to conform.

 

To address the OP, I really would need to be told which form of God is being asked after for this. I definitely do not believe world, in the grand scope, is the product of any form of intelligence that especially cares about humans. But if anyone knows Branch Spinoza's notion of God, then they know that such a thing is absurd to suppose does not exist. Yet, since Spinoza described this idea, people have been keen to note that Spinoza's notion of God is nothing more than nature.

[___ He/Him]

On 1/21/2021 at 6:53 PM, chongjasmine said:

Do you believe in God? If so, what God?

I'm a Scientologist, and in Scientology we have what are called the Eight Dynamics. These are urges to survive. The last dynamic, the eighth, is infinity, or the supreme being. I don't explicitly believe that there is a God, but I do believe in the eighth dynamic.

[elias888]

17 hours ago, sneak spooky spook guy said:

I'm a Scientologist, and in Scientology we have what are called the Eight Dynamics. These are urges to survive. The last dynamic, the eighth, is infinity, or the supreme being. I don't explicitly believe that there is a God, but I do believe in the eighth dynamic.

I find that concept really compelling, the idea of the eighth dynamic as a kind of open-ended reach toward the infinite, rather than a fixed belief in a specific deity. It leaves space for personal interpretation, which honestly feels more honest than just checking a box labeled "God". Do you see it more as a symbolic framework or something experiential?

[___ He/Him]

1 hour ago, elias888 said:

I find that concept really compelling, the idea of the eighth dynamic as a kind of open-ended reach toward the infinite, rather than a fixed belief in a specific deity. It leaves space for personal interpretation, which honestly feels more honest than just checking a box labeled "God". Do you see it more as a symbolic framework or something experiential?

It's definitely something that you have to see for yourself. I wouldn't say experimental, and I wouldn't necessarily say symbolic. The eighth dynamic is real, but you have to discover for yourself what it is.

[clowncarcrash]

I used to believe in YHVH, as the one true creator god, but I no longer believe. 

[chongjasmine]

For me, being a Christian, I believe in God. I had even heard from Him through a dream where I saw Jesus and heard something from Him. Some of my dreams were events about my future, which came to pass. 

[6 7 ✾ She♡Her ✾]

The God Beyond

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JK I'm a Jasnahist/Atheist.