In Defense of God.

[brewer]

Don't tell me what "X" does not explain, show me proof that god exists. Not a book, not stories, not how it makes you feel,..... Straight up fucking proof! Identifiable, testable, reproducible, independently verifiable.  

Until then you're just having a bad party in your brain and I'm not attending.

[The Grand Nudger]

A good point as far as it goes, but there's no requirement of proof, and proof is not the same thing as evidence..what you seem to be looking for with the qualifiers of "straight up proof".  

Consider this, when a person stands on trial and offers the "god told me too" ense, even though the jury is almost certain to contain a majority believing demographic, they don't believe that defendant.  His personal testimony is not enough for -them- to believe, and I think here that you and I and a believer are all in agreement.  However, their own personal experience (if they had one) is more difficult for them to personally deny, and here again..I think that you and I and they would all agree.  

Their experience might not meet your standards of evidence, it may even be poor evidence by their own standards, or no evidence at all, but it still forms a compelling basis for their personal beliefs. Maybe they are wrong and believe because of a bad party in their brains, but that would be wrong for the right reasons. They may possess no proof.  There may be no proof of any god at all.  Faith and proof are not synonymous, and neither requires the other - nor does faith require a personal experience or to be based on the testimony of others personal experience. A faithful person can acknowledge all of this without any issues, but, ultimately, none of that tells us anything about whether or not there is a god.

Presumably, if there is a god, a great many people will have had non-factual experiences attributed to a god all the same.

[Minimalist]

How come fucking god can't defend himself?

[The Grand Nudger]

Well, we've heard one possibility - weakness.  Maybe he lacks the ability.  Or maybe he doesn't care, having written off what people do or say in his name long, long ago.  Presumably, he knows us pretty well by now....and is there any reason to think that even a god would be capable of coming down here to all these people and getting them all on the same page against every issue they personally hold?  

Then, there's the nuclear option.  Maybe god hates us.  Maybe he enjoys watching all this strife.  Maybe he's uninterested in clearing up that little "all -loving" misconception because our anguish only deepens the sadistic pleasure he derives from watching us suffer, in his name, not even knowing him.

Could be any number of reasons.  Ultimately, you'd have to ask god...for all the good that'd do you.  

[Jesster]

I'm tired of hearing believers tell me that their god will reveal himself to me if I meet "x" criteria. When I mention that I've done that, they usually add on a "y" or a "z" to discredit my attempts. I've waited patiently for this revelation as someone who already believed on faith alone for years. Then I started demanding this revelation. Nothing. I'm still fucking waiting, but the faith is in the trash bin where it belongs.

[The Grand Nudger]

I'm tired of hearing believers tell me that their god will reveal himself to me if I meet "x" criteria. When I mention that I've done that, they usually add on a "y" or a "z" to discredit my attempts. I've waited patiently for this revelation as someone who already believed on faith alone for years. Then I started demanding this revelation. Nothing. I'm still fucking waiting, but the faith is in the trash bin where it belongs.

Me too.  Obviously those people were wrong about god or about the conditions required when they said that.  If you never do end up seeing god, at least it will have been an incredible test of patience. You'll probably come out better for it.

[WinterHold]

God made the gruesome deaths and sad events a reality. Allowing for them to happen will make us question the limits of power and control he has.

While you may choose to believe this, it's definitely not something that every believer believes in, nor is it a logical necessity of god, nor does this have to be true for there to be a god.

It makes you realize who you are and where you stand.

Maybe theists don't realize it yet; and that's exactly why they kick so hard. Some think they are superior to others, while others think they are so special.

Weakness and realizing the vast size and scale of the universe though, makes us know that above every strong there is what is stronger.

Believers who think he isn't responsible, just directed a slap to the concept of creation. 
A God who isn't responsible is a weak God. 

I'm not sure why you would choose to believe that..but for many, a god that is not responsible for grizzly murders is, at least on that count, a just god.  In any case, a "weak" god...is still a god.  

Respect can't be given to a weak entity; especially one that has no total control over its creations.
"The Creator of Everything" title cannot be earned but through the creation of "everything".  That's where I got the belief from.

A weak God is nothing but an ancient Greek fantasy; a feeder of personal ego of ancient Philosophers. Weakness strips any entity from thee Godly traits.
 

But creating it and putting a huge mark of warning over it, is so different from making it happen.

Okay?

Forcing us to do them is something totally different than giving us the choice.

Colt made guns. But it's serial killers who shot the child; not Colt.  

Sure, but in the case of many peoples beliefs, god isn't colt, in the analogy, so it's just not relevant to their god concept.  God didn't make the guns, or shoot the people.  There's certainly no requirement that god made the guns or shoot people in order to be a god..and just as before, none of what you've said has to be true for there to be a god.  If a god exists, the just god of many peoples beliefs, who is not responsible for murders, who neither makes the guns nor shoots people...or even a "weak" god might exist.  

Justice is having both penalty and reward distributed in a rightful way.
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/justice

Butchering grants us meet. Cutting down trees grant us food and heat. Eating too much will make us fat. Butchering humans will make us killers.

There's a scale; and breaking it is well known to cause disasters.

I truly think that many theists need to rethink their beliefs 

Logically; it's wrong to think he is the cause. But at the same time; he created it; put it in his test; warned people from it.

You'll have to unwind your own tangle on that one though, wouldn't you agree?  Since it's your unique belief in some personal god that you're discussing?  It's just not a problem for anyone who doesn't believe in the kind of god you believe in, and it's certainly not a problem for god, if a god exists.

[/quote]

No; belief in him means believing he created the scale.
Breaking that scale causes so many to die; or worse: tortured; spend their counted days hungry and poor.

[The Grand Nudger]

Respect can't be given to a weak entity; especially one that has no total control over its creations.

Maybe you find it difficult to respect what you consider to be weak, but that's nothing to do with a god, and a weak god is still a god.  A god doesn't need to have control over us, nor do we need to be it's creations, to be a god.  The vast majority of gods are not creator gods, and are or were not believed to control human beings, and did commonly have weaknesses.  

"The Creator of Everything" title cannot be earned but through the creation of "everything".  That's where I got the belief from.

See above.

A weak God is nothing but an ancient Greek fantasy; a feeder of personal ego of ancient Philosophers. Weakness strips any entity from thee Godly traits.

You wouldn't be arguing against greek gods, specifically, in this..and if you allowed for the weakness of god to be demonstrative of it's non-existence, of it's status as a fantasy, it's only going to take one person to come along and opine upon the weakness of allah for you to regret having said it.  
 

Forcing us to do them is something totally different than giving us the choice.

Okay.

Justice is having both penalty and reward distributed in a rightful way.
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/justice

Butchering grants us meet. Cutting down trees grant us food and heat. Eating too much will make us fat. Butchering humans will make us killers.

There's a scale; and breaking it is well known to cause disasters.

I truly think that many theists need to rethink their beliefs 

Perhaps, but I was really hoping to be able to take a more supportive position of god belief, so I'll leave it to you to tell us how all the other believers are wrong.  

No; belief in him means believing he created the scale.
Breaking that scale causes so many to die; or worse: tortured; spend their counted days hungry and poor.

Belief in your personal god might mean that, but belief in -a- god does not, nor is it necessary for that to be true of a god for a god to be a god.

[Wyrd of Gawd]

When discussing the biblical God it's best to use his preferred name and rank = "Yahweh, the God of the Hebrews and the God of the armies." So instead of using the generic "God", which might be any of the thousands of other deities, if you write something like =

"Do you believe in Yahweh, the God of the Hebrews and the God of the armies?" it makes it very specific instead of generic like "Do you believe in God?"

[Astonished]

So what I'm hearing is a lot of 'well, you can't disprove the deist god' bullshit. That's helpful.

You can't infer from nature that a designer is 'good' in terms of humanity, you can infer that they are either indifferent or cruel enough to take the occasional deliberate potshot.

What then, if no guidebook, no direct communication, or anything of the sort, can give any other real or rational indications about this supposed deity (whose minimum requirement is the capability to design at least one universe, however competently or incompetently), including whether or not one (or more) even exist, to the point where there is any point whatsoever in discussing or speculating?

It is literally a non-issue in this case and should have no impact whatsoever on our lives. Deism as a concept is even stupider than theism because at least theists have something (as spurious as it is, their antiquated texts and traditions) to legitimately argue about.