What would convince you that a god exists?

[paulpablo]

It wouldn't take much for me to believe, I'm quite open minded.
Things for me that would point to the existence of the christian or muslim god existing would be some of the following things.

1. Evidence of gods word being spread divinely as opposed to the word of god being spread by mans conquests throughout the world, for example if the first pioneers had found a quran or bible in America or Australia or Papa New Guinea or in the absence of a book if they even followed to same type of rules as muslims or christians or had the same religious signs.

2. In the same sort of theme as the first point I'd also expect there to be less variation in religions, and for there to be less cultural divides among religions. If god has revealed himself to the world and the revelation is so obvious and evident then why are most people indoctrinated into religion by the nearest authority figure within that culture for example parents or charity givers or colonial rulers.

3. Again in the same theme as the last 2 points in the theme of cultures I would consider the concept of god to be more likely to be real if there weren't so many gods that no one believes in.
The fact is any maniac, layman and average joe can invent an imaginary friend in the form of a god, and every culture has. Some mexicans even have a god of drug smuggling, the aztecs had a god that needed human sacrifice, the romans, greeks and vikings had many gods.
It would be more believable if humans didn't seem to have the natural tendency to make up imaginary friends when they don't know what's going on, don't understand something traumatic or just want good luck with something.

4. Angels visiting every decade upon the entire earth telling people not to forget to keep up the muslim or christian faith. You may ask how would you know these aren't aliens, you wouldn't know but you would know someone very powerful wants you to be a muslim or christian so its highly likely there may be something to following a religion.

5. I would expect there to be less vague clutching at straws types of proof of god that exists. Also less outright cons. For example evangelists conning people for money, muslims asking for money for prayers, muslims on websites saying things like "the quran mentions metal and sound, this is god predicting radar technology so he must exist" or "the quran says we are made from water in parts, a lot of us is water, this is a miracle".

[frz]

Less chaos.

[pocaracas]

4. Angels visiting every decade upon the entire earth telling people not to forget to keep up the muslim or christian faith. You may ask how would you know these aren't aliens, you wouldn't know but you would know someone very powerful wants you to be a muslim or christian so its highly likely there may be something to following a religion.

For me, it would be something like this, but a bit more...
god itself appearing to everyone on earth every once in a while, providing some word of advice (from his super high perch) and some magic helping hand.

This having to trust other people's accounts about how you'll met this god !!after you're dead!! just makes it sound really really really made-up!

[Simsim]

I don't know !
Even a supernatural event observed by me and a handful of friends through a sober state - this would not be a final evidence for the existence of God. It would be an evidence of that there may be something beyond Nature (not necessarily a god) or an evidence of that there is something very natural which we can't understand so it appears to us as supernatural.

OK, if God exists he will be the pantheistic god who is not separated from Nature and the whole existence. So if he exists I will be a part of him and have, in principle, the ability to contact him directly even though he is himself beyond time and place. If i could contact him, delivered some power from him, could control some phenomena or show some abilities not available for humans and my abilities were observed by sober humans ( 23 persons at least ) __ I would then probably believe in the existence of God.

[Tonus]

What would convince YOU that God, Allah, or even the supernatural exists?

I'm just going to copy/paste my reply from another forum, where the same question was asked. This was in reply to a request for something more specific than just "proof/evidence."

I would think that a being who could demonstrate the supernatural would at least convince me of the existence of the supernatural. Someone who could read thoughts, or levitate, or miraculously heal the sick and change the weather and feed the world and make the world's nuclear stockpile turn into soap bubbles. Proof of being an honest-to-goodness deity might follow from that, as well.

The problem I see with the question is that often it implies that there might be something that would convince me that the god of the Bible, or of any of our major religious movements, is real. But those gods, as envisioned, make little or no sense and the way they are described makes me terrified at the thought that they would ever be real. I don't WANT for Yahweh to present himself to us and tell us that he's real. He's a miserable and angry and bitter person with a penchant for capricious decisions to massacre people wholesale. He can't possibly exist, and I don't want him to.

I could imagine a god who created the universe and then went on to some other reality in order to create a universe there. And maybe he stops by to see how we're getting along, and he manifests as something truly godlike in stature and capabilities, and he gives us a guidebook that is so amazing that it doesn't take long for us to cure AIDS and cancer and stop fighting wars. And then he apologizes for waiting so long to check up on us, and he tips his cap and moves on to the next reality. That's a god that I can stomach.

[downbeatplumb]

Define god.

I have never seen a really good definition.

The latest shit to spew from the keyboards of theists is "The universe had a beginning and we call the cause god..........................................................................oh and he watches you masterbate and hates gays"

[Mononoke]

If I lost a limb, this was confirmed, and without medical intervention but with direct prayer from someone religious my limb regrew, I'd believe that the god or gods the person prayed to existed. There would be other things too, but that one comes to mind.

[Anomalocaris]

The question is, what would convince you that a god exists?

First, define for me what you would consider a god. Then, I will tell whether such a god could in principle exist, and if it could in principle exist, then what sort of evidence, if any, could convince me such a god does in fact exist.

.....even the supernatural exists?

For me "supernature" as commonly understood is a nonsensical concept. As such it in principle can't exist.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Seeing the god/goddess standing there looking at me while another person is standing there looking at the god/goddess at the same time. This way I would know it's not a hallucination.

Would the Fatima miracles be sufficient for you had you been there?

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Eradicate Evil!

That would pretty much eliminate AF. =-)

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What if Klingons and Vulcans both showed up and each had culture contained religion based on Sacrificial Atonement of a divine Klingon/Vulcan that arose from the dead?

[Minimalist]

Certainly not. No more than Cheese Doodle jesus.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miracle_of_..._the_event

Pio Scatizzi, Society of Jesus, described the events of that day on Fátima, and he concluded:

The ... solar phenomena were not observed in any observatory. Impossible that they should escape notice of so many astronomers and indeed the other inhabitants of the hemisphere... there is no question of an astronomical or meteorological event phenomenon... Either all the observers in Fátima were collectively deceived and erred in their testimony, or we must suppose an extra-natural intervention.

Or, more likely, they were all just a bunch of dumb fuck catholics!