(February 25, 2012 at 12:56 pm)Rhythm Wrote: Those need'nt be the bar. We're talking about claims to those attributes, aren't we? One doesn't have to find a god with those attributes to justify their inclusion or exclusion in the metrics of how we classify "god" or "gods" or what is or is not a "god". Some gods are not claimed to be omni-anything, for example.
Quote: How about a critter that can do a couple things we can't do,
Well, that's problematic from the word go. God's are not commonly "critters" of any kind (though sometimes they are). They are usually entirely different from anything else we would call a creature in many important ways.
Quote:lives enough longer than we do to have a significantly different perspective and who knows a hell of a lot by virtue of having lived so long.Are we talking about a god or an old, wise, creature? As per the above, there can be some differentiating factors. We are old, wise creatures with respect to ants. That doesn't make us gods, does it?
Quote:I don't think I want to make Her a mind reader but lets suppose our motives and intent are always perfectly obvious to her because she just reads people so well. While we're at it, lets say She has a Jedi's ability to go unnoticed by anyone she doesn't want to make her self known to. This allows her to go undetected by science since no scientist will perceive the evidence of her that is there unless she permits it. Is that a 'god'?
It's a claim that parrots some god claims in many ways. How did you hear about this god, how do we know it has these attributes (or that these attributes are even possible in theory)? These are the places where claims are really fleshed out and become falsifiable. "I can imagine something" doesn't require any debunking. "What I'm imagining may exist" can always be approached.
It is incredibly difficult to imagine completely detached gods. It's easy to argue for the unknown sure, but calling it god and giving it some attribute (such as creator) isn't arguing for the unknown anymore. We'd be defining it (as a god), and something physically demonstrable that it has done (in the act of creation). That sounds like a whole lot of "known" for the "unknown"...to me.
I have to think that if anything was discovered that in any way met a minimal description of a god, it would have to be something of the natural world. If god by definition is something other than knowable then of course it can't exist and will never be discoverable. That's why I wonder what would be the minimal skill set required for the title of god.
I don't think that gods have to be creators. The greek and roman gods weren't creators. As for the idea that we're pretty god-like I think that is spot on. After all we're the ones who invented the category. Perhaps it takes one to know one? When I argue against determinism and they suggest that free willers are imagining a little god inside us, I like to say that no we just are our own gods. We may be a kind of god-lite or godlet, but in the arena of sapience we're the best we've found.
