Quote:
Originally posted by CSflim
Lebell, you enjoy telling me about all of this wonderful evidence that you have for the existence of God, yet you provide none. You did the exact same thing in a previous thread.
Like I said...I'm all ears when it comes to your evidence.
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I wouldn't exactly call it "enjoy", but I won't remain silent, especially when you present inaccurate or incomplete statements.
Nor do I think you are "all ears", since it appears that unless it can be measured or reproduced, it is not "evidence". (Nor is it, in the scientific sense.)
I will also correct you in that I've answered the question of "why I believe" at least twice that I can think of on TFP.
All that being said, I will answer a third time.
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Proving God?
Proving or disproving God is a fool's errand, as witnessed by the facts each side in the debate attempts to present.
Athiests will point to the fact that God as an entity can not be seen or measured, and that typical theological 'proofs' such as the burning bush, visions, out of body experiences, and the like can be explained away by modern science. For them, no proof logically leads to no God, via Occam's razor.
The faithful on the other hand, counter that God must be approached by belief or "faith" and that any attempt to prove God or to quantitize God is doomed to failure since God will thwart such efforts.
My personal contention is that any person who does have faith in a higher power (be He Buddah, Jesus or Allah) must acknowledge that which is most frightening of all: The possibility that there is really no one there.
So the question then becomes, if you acknowledge your belief may be wrong, then why believe? Aren't you happier facing the "probable" grim reality instead of releaving your fear in a "fantasy"?
Ultimately this answer must be a personal one and perhaps this is why science cannot (or maybe was never intended) to answer with theorems, measurements, etc.
My reasons for believing span well over 3 decades, so such a condensation does not do them justice, but in brief, I believe one of the dichotomies of this existance is that you generally find what you are looking for.
If you are looking for unhappy people everywhere and a miserable existance, you will probably find it. Conversely, if you look for the good in people and a generally joyous existance, you seem to find that as well.
So too, I believe it with the search for God.
I find it intellectually curious that science (of which I am an ardent proponent) cannot seem to squash God out of reality. There always seems to be wiggle room for an "Almighty" that can't be proved away. This can be seen in the Heisenburg (sp?) uncertainty principle, super space theory and chaos theory. This can also be seen in the above mentioned visions, along with past life experiences, levitation, and prayer healing, to name a few.
But we still come to that pesky, "Yeah, but maybe science just hasn't gotten around to explaining that yet" and I concede the point.
But for me, the bottom line is this: There appears to be much to me that indicates some higher existance than the one we experience in the daily grind. Further, those that I would consider far along in a spiritual life (The Dali Lama, Mother Theresa, Thomas Merton) seem to have a peace, a...a...
something that is beyond words and physical explaination.
So my own scale tips and I choose to believe that there is a God.
And to date, the path that has proven most rewarding in pursuing the "God" I've choosen to believe in is Christianity.
And I don't believe that God would have it any other way.