(March 28, 2018 at 8:52 pm)chrisNub Wrote:

(March 28, 2018 at 8:44 pm)mh.brewer Wrote: Bad assumption, subjectively moral. And I was thinking bigger picture, not just pain and suffering. Stop thinking only about the human condition.

hmm... then what are the imperfections, from a hypothetical creators perspective, that you were referring to?

Mass extinctions for one. Humans also face this if you consider earths history as a valid predictor.

(March 28, 2018 at 9:01 pm)mh.brewer Wrote:

(March 28, 2018 at 8:52 pm)chrisNub Wrote: hmm... then what are the imperfections, from a hypothetical creators perspective, that you were referring to?

Mass extinctions for one. Humans also face this if you consider earths history as a valid predictor.

Yeah but after the dinosaurs, humans evolved and now AI and cyborg technology look like they could play a big part in our futures. Anyway, I don't really want to argue this point with you. Maybe you're right, IDK.

Ends-justifying-means-god.

I don't know about you, but to me, if ebola was somehow a tool to enlighten a couple of people...I wouldn't exactly call that a net gain. Could've just skipped ebola and went straight to enlightenment.

Unless Jeff's a shit programmer -and- a trash person...ofc.

(March 28, 2018 at 9:25 pm)Khemikal Wrote: Ends-justifying-means-god.

I don't know about you, but to me, if ebola was somehow a tool to enlighten a couple of people...I wouldn't exactly call that a net gain.  Could've just skipped ebola and went straight to enlightenment.

Unless Jeff's a shit programmer -and- a trash person.

Idk man, are you saying that a hypothetical god could be trying to enlighten people through suffering? Sounds like a religious belief and wasn't the point of the OP. I'm tapping out. Really nice talking to you guys, for real. Cya though

(March 28, 2018 at 9:30 pm)chrisNub Wrote:

(March 28, 2018 at 9:25 pm)Khemikal Wrote: Ends-justifying-means-god.

I don't know about you, but to me, if ebola was somehow a tool to enlighten a couple of people...I wouldn't exactly call that a net gain.  Could've just skipped ebola and went straight to enlightenment.

Unless Jeff's a shit programmer -and- a trash person.

Idk man, are you saying that a hypothetical god could be trying to enlighten people through suffering? Sounds like a religious belief and wasn't the point of the OP. I'm tapping out. Really nice talking to you guys, for real. Cya though

Oh no.

Once you're here there's no leaving.

Those who leave us never return because they're hunted down and kil-

I mean, nice to see you. Hope to see you again!

(March 28, 2018 at 9:30 pm)chrisNub Wrote:

(March 28, 2018 at 9:25 pm)Khemikal Wrote: Ends-justifying-means-god.

I don't know about you, but to me, if ebola was somehow a tool to enlighten a couple of people...I wouldn't exactly call that a net gain.  Could've just skipped ebola and went straight to enlightenment.

Unless Jeff's a shit programmer -and- a trash person.

Idk man, are you saying that a hypothetical god could be trying to enlighten people through suffering? Sounds like a religious belief and wasn't the point of the OP. I'm tapping out. Really nice talking to you guys, for real. Cya though

The op sounds like a religious belief too.  A'dios.

(March 28, 2018 at 9:48 pm)Khemikal Wrote:

(March 28, 2018 at 9:30 pm)chrisNub Wrote: Idk man, are you saying that a hypothetical god could be trying to enlighten people through suffering? Sounds like a religious belief and wasn't the point of the OP. I'm tapping out. Really nice talking to you guys, for real. Cya though

The op sounds like a religious belief too.  A'dios.

(March 28, 2018 at 4:37 pm)chrisNub Wrote: Hello everyone, I'm new to the forums. I consider myself agnostic but I also consider myself to be a bit of an idiot (seriously).  It seems to me that quite a lot of athiests are pretty smart and I have a question I would like to ask.

If this reality were a simulation then there could be a base reality that we are unaware of that has no god. In this scenario would the creators and rulers of our simulation not be considered gods from our perspectives? or if this is base reality, I think it's possible that one day mankind could also create a simulation where the creators could be considered gods by the people inhabiting the simulation. I'm not saying anything either way other than it's just weird to think about.

For example IMO it's possible hypothetically that this is a prison of sorts, where our memories have been wiped and we suffer in all kinds of ways that we wouldn't have in base reality. Or if this is base reality, one day it might be more efficient to grow humans to adulthood and because they have a lot to learn their minds might be put into a simulation, while they grow, where they can learn and live out whole lives. Obviously these ideas sound crazy but it is interesting IMO how little we actually know (with absolute certainty) about our own reality.

I'm not atheist because it isn't obvious to me that this reality isn't a simulation and if this were a simulation then its creators would be our gods I figure because there's no difference between believing in a god in a religious way (in the sense that an intelligence started our universe and created it's rules) and believing that we are living in a simulation that was created by an intelligence. So if science finds strong evidence that our reality is a simulation then aren't they providing evidence for the existence of god (or gods)? I guess it depends how you would define a god but to me it's exactly the same but maybe i'm trip'n. I really want feedback from an atheists perspective on this. Thanks for reading

Hi there!

Yes, those are coherent scenarios, much more so than any religious proposal. They are ones I've referred to before as well. The problem is that "God" is a super-elastic word, meaning anything people want it to. So I'm technically not an atheist either, in the sense that I don't know what a God is until a particular person defines it. I can then react to their "God" idea specifically. Usually this is with disbelief at best.

It's also coherent that we've already unwittingly created other manifestations of computer programs where the elements have become self-aware. How would we know? We wouldn't believe a virtual person if it told us it was self-aware. For the same reason, any potential God/programmer wouldn't necessarily know we are aware either. Nor that it would care if it knew.

My perspective is that I don't care if this is a simulation or not. It doesn't change my experiences, and I have to function in this framework regardless. I don't care what the programmers might have intended either.

(March 28, 2018 at 5:52 pm)Lutrinae Wrote: OP: you said, "if".  I personally only deal with ifs when writing fiction.  Otherwise, in reality, I deal with certainties.

Firstly, welcome new person to the best forum in the world.

Hey Kit, I though only theists deal with certainties

(March 28, 2018 at 4:37 pm)chrisNub Wrote: Hello everyone, I'm new to the forums. I consider myself agnostic but I also consider myself to be a bit of an idiot (seriously).  It seems to me that quite a lot of athiests are pretty smart and I have a question I would like to ask.

If this reality were a simulation then there could be a base reality that we are unaware of that has no god. In this scenario would the creators and rulers of our simulation not be considered gods from our perspectives? or if this is base reality, I think it's possible that one day mankind could also create a simulation where the creators could be considered gods by the people inhabiting the simulation. I'm not saying anything either way other than it's just weird to think about.

For example IMO it's possible hypothetically that this is a prison of sorts, where our memories have been wiped and we suffer in all kinds of ways that we wouldn't have in base reality. Or if this is base reality, one day it might be more efficient to grow humans to adulthood and because they have a lot to learn their minds might be put into a simulation, while they grow, where they can learn and live out whole lives. Obviously these ideas sound crazy but it is interesting IMO how little we actually know (with absolute certainty) about our own reality.

I'm not atheist because it isn't obvious to me that this reality isn't a simulation and if this were a simulation then its creators would be our gods I figure because there's no difference between believing in a god in a religious way (in the sense that an intelligence started our universe and created it's rules) and believing that we are living in a simulation that was created by an intelligence. So if science finds strong evidence that our reality is a simulation then aren't they providing evidence for the existence of god (or gods)? I guess it depends how you would define a god but to me it's exactly the same but maybe i'm trip'n. I really want feedback from an atheists perspective on this. Thanks for reading

It's way over my head, but scenarios like this one are exactly why I think self-evident rules of logical inference and mathematical axioms are in some sense more reliable than empirical evidence when it comes to matters of absolute knowledge. If our universe is actually some kind of pseudo-reality invented by intelligent beings outside of it, it seems reasonable to assume that they would also be capable of creating and altering the physical "laws" operating inside it (the same way people can fly in video games but not in reality). Perhaps all of our physical senses are systematically leading us astray because they are interpreting phony information from the phony reality, but it seems to me that the purest logical axioms couldn't be manipulated in the same way. It's possible that some very intelligent people have already used these to logically refute the "simulation" theory in some way, but I haven't read up on it lately.