The gods hide so the priests don't have to trot them out.

(November 10, 2014 at 8:25 pm)snowtracks Wrote: René Descartes reasoned that the 5 senses are unreliable -

Which was a good start, but that reasoning alone was insufficient. We'd have to wait awhile yet to determine whether or not they indeed where unreliable, and if so, why? We have (at least some) of those answers now.

Quote:'Knowledge of the nature of reality derives from ideas of the intellect, not the senses. '

-those ideas are based upon the data mining of the 5 senses. For better and for worse "intellect" turned out to be just as unreliable, and for the same reasons (to be fair to our senses, it's often "intellect" that ports in the unreliability - our eyes are poorly constructed to begin with....and then our brain further complicates this by simply tampering with the "image"). If you're looking at a photoshopped picture you not only have to worry about the reliability of the camera but also the reliability of the photographer. So while within the formal system we call logic we can see that our ability to flesh out a concept might be lacking, a limit upon -what we can know- using that formal system, we also have additional physical "barriers to knowledge" (I'd call the barriers in logic equivalent to a physical barrier myself, I'm of the opinion that they relate to deficiencies in hardware).

Quote:God is an inference to the best explanation. scientists sometimes postulate ideas that are unobservable in order to explain the data that is observed for instance dark energy.

You can postulate whatever you like. Dark energy is a term for an unknown "something" that has -observable effects on the known-. Were it not for those observable effects, there would be no "dark energy". If you'd like to level the ground between god and dark energy, you're going to need to do work.

(November 6, 2014 at 11:10 am)Chad32 Wrote: So we get free will just for the little things like what color clothes we wear, and our house furniture, but having serious debates over world changing issues is wrong?

free will and debate, guess he thinks they're the same. okay.

(November 15, 2014 at 1:27 pm)snowtracks Wrote:

(November 6, 2014 at 11:10 am)Chad32 Wrote: So we get free will just for the little things like what color clothes we wear, and our house furniture, but having serious debates over world changing issues is wrong?

free will and debate, guess he thinks they're the same. okay.

You want to elaborate on that statement? Do you agree that you're only allowed to have free will when it comes to little things, but not big things? Disagree? What is this statement supposed to mean?

I have read in Islam that God isn't in man shape and God is bigger than this world and he has strong light and his sight can burn what it see, may be these reasons for his hiding.

Speaking of Yahweh, according to the Bible he got so scared because of a tall tower and some iron chariots for some reason. Does this mean that said things were able to hurt him in one way or another? If so, he would have far worse things to be afraid of by now and a good reason to hide.

(November 19, 2014 at 5:23 pm)Smaug Wrote: Speaking of Yahweh, according to the Bible he got so scared because of a tall tower and some iron chariots for some reason. Does this mean that said things were able to hurt him in one way or another? If so, he would have far worse things to be afraid of by now and a good reason to hide.

He wasn't scared. He was angry. According to the bible, we're not able to hurt him physically, but apparently we're able to hurt him emotionally. When God became man in Jesus, of course, he could be hurt physically; and he was hurt a lot..

But accroding to the Bible Yahweh is omnipotent. Doesn't that mean that no finite action (physical or mental) could alter his state (i.e. hurt in any way)? And by the way, why an omnipotent being would objectively be in need of any kind of worship all along? The level of endurance of omnipotent being's self-confidence must be way above any harm that might be inflicted opon it by non-omnipotent beings. Why does he feel insecure regardless of omnipotence?
And there's another account of Yahweh's ungrounded(?) paranoia in Genesis 3. If he's omnipotent, there's no way Adam and Eve's actions were going to hurt them.

(November 19, 2014 at 6:04 pm)Smaug Wrote: But accroding to the Bible Yahweh is omnipotent. Doesn't that mean that no finite action (physical or mental) could alter his state (i.e. hurt in any way)? And by the way, why an omnipotent being would objectively be in need of any kind of worship all along? The level of endurance of omnipotent being's self-confidence must be way above any harm that might be inflicted opon it by non-omnipotent beings.
And there's another account of Yahweh's ungrounded(?) paranoia in Genesis 3. If he's omnipotent, there's no way Adam and Eve's actions were going to hurt them.

I don't know why you would say that. To me, the fact that we were created with emotions signals me that God could very well have emotions. In the bible he demonstrates anger, happiness and love. I assume if he loves he can also be hurt emotionally. Why not?

In case you assume God of the Bible to have similar emotions as humans bear in mind that emotional reactions very much depend on subject's abilities, situation, self-confidence etc. Anger, for example, is in fact an emotion of weakness and impotence. If you're uncontent with some situation and you absolutely positively have power to alter it to suit your demands you have no reason to be angry. The more you're in control, the less you have reason to become angry at something. Yahweh, being omnipotent, had absolutely no need to feel anger at all. Nothing could get in his way and make him feel insecure, weak or threatened and thus become enraged. While in Genesis 3 he became rather paranoid and furious about the situation with the Serpent, Adam and Eve and administered very severe punishment while he could just revert the history to the point when the Serpent advised Eve to eat the fruit and change the Serpent's mind per say. Or alter their minds aposteriori. No need to be angry or to administer unproportional and unjust punishments.