Seriously, what's it take to be a god?

[The Grand Nudger]

Since we do not know God's primary attribute, all of his secondary attributes are considered to be "mutashabih" (implicit or unclear) which means that they cannot be literally understood from the words themselves.

Oh, you mean platitudes. Convenient.

[Whateverist]

I don't really have a good way to explain this, but here's what I think.

In Islam, God is called many things such as the All-Aware, the Most High, the Alive, the Eternal, the Preserver, the Wise, the Hidden, the Perceiver, the Resurrector, and the Watcher, for example, among a bunch of other names in Arabic mentioned in the Quran. Since we do not know God's primary attribute, all of his secondary attributes are considered to be "mutashabih" (implicit or unclear) which means that they cannot be literally understood from the words themselves.

For example, God describes Himself with the attribute of "knowledge." The meaning of the word "knowledge" is well-known and understood by all of us. When this attribute is applied to God, we know and understand the meaning of this attribute, but the actuality and the how-ness of this "knowledge" can never be understood.

Similarly, when God describes Himself as "All-Hearing" and "All-Watchful," we understand the meaning of the words themselves, but we do not understand the hown-ess of those attributes when applied to God because He does not possess any eyes or ears as we humans possess.

So it seems the only descriptors we have amount to superlatives. Most high/best at everything. Then we have to consider the source of the eye witness accounts. Desert nomads from a couple millenia ago. I wonder how hard it would have been to earn high superlative ratings from that crowd. Heck, send one of us back armed to the teeth with technology and they might just decide we were the best/most high in a number of categories.

So if I am ever to budge from a 6 to a 7 as an atheist I need a much better description of just what counts as a 'god'. I can't rule out something so ill defined.

So thank you Rayaan for giving me your details. But I find I still have many unanswered questions.

Regarding being eternal, the first and last, etc...
..what if there really are gods but they turn out to only live approximately 2 billion years. I'd be willing to grant god status to such a creature depending on what other attributes it possessed. I don't see any reason to hold the bar higher than that but reasonable people may disagree.

Regarding their creative function...
..what if they collectively do bring shit into creation but only as a kind of excretion function? If that truly was the source of the universe as we find it, should we nullify such beings' claim to godhood because they do not fashion the universe deliberately with an eye for perfection? Hell if each galaxy or singularity represented one godly turdball, I say the creative function has been satisfied. If god made us as the result of an involuntary god-bodily function, I say that counts. I would be willing to acknowledge such a one's godly status.

Regarding the establishment of morality, judgement and possibly eternal sticks and carrots...
..Christianity would lead us to look for such but not all religions insist on it. So I say this attribute is optional. A candidate for god may accrue extra points for possessing these skill sets (especially from a Christian judge) but I couldn't in good conscience rule a candidate out who lacked any of these. For all we know morality is entirely up to us and a matter of no consequence to the powers which be. I don't see why a god that shits galaxies should be any more concerned with whether I play well with others than it is with whether a carnivore eats another being. It may turn out that the only gods we find are much less interested in us than we are in them.

So what other attributes should I be looking for? What other requirements should there be for the title of god? Please people, I really do want to graduate from my status as a class 6 atheist but unless I get a better description for what counts as a god, how will I ever rule them out?

[The Grand Nudger]

I would say that an ability to perform some function or feat that we are wholly incapable of performing (even if we were presented with a complete knowledge of how it was done) would weigh into my criteria. I don't think that an entity that was peddling convincing illusions or clever gadgets would cut it for me.
(like shitting out a galaxy.....but even that...meh..I don't know..I shit out biochemical galaxies every day, I just don't appreciate the miracle of it because I am of a "certain size" relative to my galactic turdball)

[Whateverist]

I would say that an ability to perform some function or feat that we are wholly incapable of performing (even if we were presented with a complete knowledge of how it was done) would weigh into my criteria. I don't think that an entity that was peddling convincing illusions or clever gadgets would cut it for me.
(like shitting out a galaxy.....but even that...meh..I don't know..I shit out biochemical galaxies every day, I just don't appreciate the miracle of it because I am of a "certain size" relative to my galactic turdball)

And I'm suggesting that even if gods do exist, the miraculousness of their creations may fail to impress them too. Likewise, they may be no more impressed with us than we are with a microbe that calls our G. I. tract home. If it turned out that dark matter and energy were aspects of a 'being', maybe we've found our god?

When you go looking for gods or evidence of their absence it sure helps to know what you're looking for. I'd hate to find out that hunting gods is like hunting snipe.