Is god real?

[Question Mark]

Hestia exists. She lives in my fireplace and blesses my family with good fortune.

[Angrboda]

[pocaracas]

Wow!!! My very own meme/de-motivational!

[The Grand Nudger]

Allow me to come back to my original question: how do you define real?

Concepts exist. Concepts are real.
Do entities for which we have concepts also exist? Are they real?
The concept of the entity exists, but does the entity itself exist?

Like I said in this thread earlier, for sake of argument I'm always ready to start at some agreed upon experience and work from there. That's "real", at least insomuch as the conversation is concerned.

Tough one aint it, I mean if we really want to split hairs -do- concept exist? Of course I'm willing to agree with you that they do. It's also important to remember that sometimes the "thing" which the concept refers to exists in what we agreed upon as real and sometimes it does not (socks and fairies) - but regardless of which side of this line the entity or thing in question falls upon...the concept is not the -thing-.

So, do fairies and gods and the like exist and are they real? Sure, so long as we don't demand that they be like socks. Of course we can always disagree. That, by the by, is what irritates me most about conversations or disagreements as to whether or not god is real, or god exists, and what we mean by that. Apparently the stories just aren't good enough, superman just doesn't have value unless he actually rescues one from a burning building. The stories get ignored, completely, in favor of the faith (which is strange, since I keep getting informed that these faiths are in fact based upon those stories...). All of this is venting, nothing to do with you..lol.

Engaging in a theists favorite version of his "is god real" song and dance in the way that he desperately hopes that you will is just asking for a little ineptitude and ignorance be injected into ones life.