If God is the Universe - are you still an Athiest?

[Ned]

Originally posted by Flip McWho
Well in the dictionary I just looked up it defines God as 'the creator and ruler of the universe'. This would suggest that God is not the actual universe.

Anyway, if God is defined as the universe then yes as we all should be undoubtfully aware the universe does exist and as such God should exist. Considering I wouldn't use this definition, I'm agnostic as there is no way to prove that a God exists or not. No way at all.

I do have a theory though. Once upon a time God did exist but God sacrificed himself to start the universe and all existence, i.e God was everything but then the big bang (God sacrificing himself) happened and thus started off all existence. Nice theory eh, now prove it wrong.

Oh skywalker is right. If God is not a part of the set of the universe that contains everything then God cannot exist. Becaues if the universe contains everything then it is illogical for something to not be apart of everything.

Existence did not begin with the big bang. There was something before that. If we understand God to bethat which existed only after the big bang, then God was created. This is inconsistent with an idea that God was the creator and was not created.

God must therefor exist in the universe, the big band and before. As Einstein said, God must be the Totality of everything.

If one defines God to be even indepedent from existence, then I that is where we depart into the unknowable.

Aparently there are multiple definitions of God, among them

Pantheism: God is all and all is God. God is part of reality – he does not transcend it.
Deism: God transcends the world, but does not actively participate in it. God created the world, but allows it to run on its own.
Theism: God exists both outside the world and within the world. God both created the world and participates in it.

http://www.does-god--exist.com/

This site as well starts its discussion of what or who is God? Atheism would have to agree that there is a God if God is defined as existence as in Pantheism.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Ned


This is the first legitimate attempt in this thread by an atheist (I going through from page one) to define what he understands God to be?

Agathon, where did you get that definition?

From teaching "Does God exist" in 1001 undergraduate tutorials.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by Lorizael


Plato and Paul would probably not get along then...

Probably not, but they are concerned about different things.

Plato's fundamental worry is about identity in difference: how two things can be the same kind of thing, without being exactly the same thing. From that follow the Forms and Aristotle's immanent universals.

The Churchlands are worried about the non-scientific character of our talk about beliefs and desires.

[Lorizael]

Originally posted by Ned
This is very close to where I am at -- until that is, I realized the essential problem is defining who or what God is.

In looking up the definition of God, I found that Einstein did believe in God in the sense of that He was the sum total of everything -- in essence the universe. This is also very close to the Greek understanding of one, everlasting, perfect God. It is not inconsistent with the Christian understanding either.

If we define God to be the Universe, the of course we all believe in God. But if we start from the premise that there is no God, what does one mean by that? One must have an understanding of God to deny that God does exists.

See my mission in life is to create what you describe. I see this giant universe connected by an infinite number of interactions and I want to bring consciousness to this entity. I want to do this for reasons that I don't feel like going into right now, but it has to do with my view of God and morality and such.

No, I'm not trying to become God, but I am trying to know God (though I use the term the Creating Force because it's very vague and doesn't single out any one religion or theology). I don't want to know all of God, though, because I think that is impossible.

By my view, the creating force of the universe is the one being with free will, and as such there are an infinite number of things that it can do. Because of this, it is impossible to understand this entity fully.

[Ned]

Re: Re: If God is the Universe - are you still an Athiest?

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


Firstly, atheists do not necessarily deny the existence of god(s). They merely deny that there is any good reason to believe in one. Secondly, using "God" customarily denotes the big Y, or the god of Judeo-Christianity, who is pretty well defined according to orthodox Christian doctrines. Third, isn't it more ironic that theists believe in something they don't know who or what if such is the case?



You can't simply keep redefining words or moving goal posts. What if we define humans having 3 eyes and 6 legs?



Not necessarily. Atheism merely is an outgrowth of naturalism and materialism, which states that there's nothing outside this universe and there's nothing supernatural.



I understand "God" as the orthodox Judeo-Christianity deity.

Urban Ranger: The definition of God in the Catholic Church is found in the Nicene Creed which we recite every Mass:

We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.

Now, that definition is consistent with God being the Universe when the Universe includes the big bang and what existed before the big bang. Therefor, there appears to be no facial inconsistency between Atheism's understanding of Universe and the Catholic God.

[JimmyCracksCorn]

But isn't the Universe finite? And if it is, does that not suggest that there might be something beyond it, and if so, who created that?

Or are people defining Universe as just everything?

[Ned]

Originally posted by Lorizael


See my mission in life is to create what you describe. I see this giant universe connected by an infinite number of interactions and I want to bring consciousness to this entity. I want to do this for reasons that I don't feel like going into right now, but it has to do with my view of God and morality and such.

No, I'm not trying to become God, but I am trying to know God (though I use the term the Creating Force because it's very vague and doesn't single out any one religion or theology). I don't want to know all of God, though, because I think that is impossible.

By my view, the creating force of the universe is the one being with free will, and as such there are an infinite number of things that it can do. Because of this, it is impossible to understand this entity fully.

In a way, science search for understanding of the universe is consistent with a search for God. When the ancients wrote down their understanding of God, it was the creator of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen. In the modern age, we have discovered the Universe, the big bang and are beginning to understand the laws of nature. The more we understand of existence, the more we know that the ancient understanding is consistent with the modern scientific understanding of the universe.

As science advances understanding, we are finding that the universe and the ancient understanding of God are increasingly congruent.

[JimmyCracksCorn]

Originally posted by Ned
As science advances understanding, we are finding that the universe and the ancient understanding of God are increasingly congruent.

Yeah, ideas don't really change that much over time if you think about it, they just become more and more complex.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by JimmyCracksCorn
But isn't the Universe finite? And if it is, does that not suggest that there might be something beyond it, and if so, who created that?

Or are people defining Universe as just everything?

That is the definition of the Universe, yes

Anyways, if the universe is finite (which is not necessarily true), then I would say that suggests that there ISN'T something "beyond" it

[lightblue]

Just a little something: What about parallel universes?

[Kuciwalker]

That's an oxymoron. As the Iniverse is the set of that which exists, nothing can exist outside of the Universe, including another Universe.

[lightblue]

I thought universe was usually defined as the space-time bubble that was created by the big bang, contains our and billions of other galaxies and is still expanding. As we can't look past this barrier, you cannot prove that other such instances do not exist, and as a rule, if it's happened once, it's happened more than once. These wouldn't be parallel as such, but would still signify multiple "universes". Parallel universes are a by product of relativity theory if my memory serves me right.

Anyway to the original question. Even if you described the universe as God, what difference would it make? You'd just redefine a word. The picture that theists paint of god is not compatible with a collection of galaxies. The closest "theist" theory you could point to is the Gaian theories and nature worshipping religions.

[Kuciwalker]

The "big bang" did not create anything. This is a common misconception. The Universe existed prior to it, just the dimensions were almost infinitely tiny. The big bang was the point when it suddenly started expanding (and very quickly).

If you aren't defining the Universe as the set of all that exists, and rather just the contiguous spacetime in which we are located, then that's something different. However, then the Universe is no different from any region of spacetime, so it becomes rather pointless for a philisophical (or scientific) debate.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by skywalker


That is the definition of the Universe, yes

That is [i]your definition[i] of the universe. Not everyone agrees.

[Kuciwalker]

That's probably also the only meaningful definition of the Universe. Define it as a simple region of spacetime and it loses all of its special properties.