Thread: Thoughts on the nature of God from an agnostic atheist

Exactly, supernatural things don't exit. If God is supernatural then he doesn't exit. If God isn't supernatural, then he isn't a god. If God isn't supernatural then he is acting on all the same rules as everything else in the universe, and so he has no special powers and so can't be considered a God. If a god is just a really advanced alien with a lot of knowledge on how to properly use the rules of the universe to do what he wants to do, then he isn't a god, he is just a really advanced alien. A god without any special powers is never going to be a god, just a life form with advanced knowledge.

I wouldn't rule out the possibility of advanced life forms living in our universe(though I don't believe any have ever visited earth), but just by the definitions a God can't exist.

This is getting really interesting now. I see the points on both sides.

If it's just a sort of nature spirit, then in what way is it a god? Did it create the universe? If so, then it must be capable of existing outside of the universe, right? Ergo by definition supernatural - it doesn't exist within the confines of space and time inside this universe.

Maybe it just created life on earth? An earth spirit. Maybe it's somehow connected to all living things, binding them together somehow telepathically or whatever. But would that be a god? If it doesn't control things through supernatural agency, then it couldn't be called omnipotent.

To me that would be a nature spirit or just a connectedness that we all share. Would it have a consciousness of its own? Or just sort of be the aggregate of all consciousness on earth? Or maybe in the universe? Maybe I've just slipped back into materialistic thinking and I can't conceive of it the way you are Juroara. When I read what you write it seems like I do, at least to an extent, but then Alric responds and I'm all like "well, yeah... "

A little more pondering..

A god who works entirely through natural processes..

If it created the universe and set the natural laws into motion and then just sort of slipped away and let things run their course, then it's not a god that looks over us and cares if we believe or anything. More like an inventor.


Another possibility is, maybe he did it like that but still intervenes sometimes. But somehow this sounds ridiculous - once you begin to see it as something natural or that can only work through nature, but maybe can sometimes interfere with it, it seems like sort of a part-time god. Once I let myself start to think of it that way I immediately go back to thinking that must just be wishful thinking on the part of people who want to see a warm helpful presence when they stare into the void of nature or space. Like children separated from their parents who still have an unconscious need or desire to feel comforted now that they're gone, and so the see a great father figure in everything they can't quite understand. This would be a very understandable reaction for a species that has suddenly risen into awareness of its own mortality, it would very likely make the whole species a bit obsessive compulsive. Like kids who suddenly realize their parents are gone and start comforting themselves by saying "Look, we haven't gone over that next hill yet, I'll bet they're just past it".

This seems to be the reaction I have whenever I reduce the idea of god to anything less than full-on supernatural badass.

These last posts were excellent, it was a pleasure to read them.

One relevant question I think it's worth considering:

Maybe it just created life on earth? An earth spirit. Maybe it's somehow connected to all living things, binding them together somehow telepathically or whatever.

How could a non-physical entity (whatever that means) could interact with a physical entity? This is also the question that juroara made:

What does consciousness consist of?

I've yet to find a good argument for substance dualism, so how could god "be conscious"? It's really interesting because you're picking something physical (the brain), and making it interact with a non-physical "substance" (consciousness). So, even if consciousness wasn't physical (aka, it did not exist in the nature realm), how could then it interact with the brain? But could god be an entity without consciousness? For example, his behavior be a cause of unconscious processing, like some sort of computer following an algorithm? From what we understand from objective truths (like the laws of physics), this doesn't sound that crazy. Because then you could indeed say god isn't physical: just like "justice" isn't something physical, but it relates to physical concepts. God could simply be the name we'd give to the rules of reality.

Hmm..never thought about it this way...interesting.

This is why I'm an ignostic. The concept of a god is so abstract and can be defined so many ways, a definition needs to be chosen before we can really answer the question. You can't just ask, "Is there a god?" What kind of god? An all-powerful being that controls everything? A being that exists outside of the Universe that created it but does not intervene in day-to-day events? A spirit of nature and Earth that works through natural processes?

I guess that's the most unanswerable part. Somehow consciousness, whatever it is, does exist, and it either is physical, arises from the physical, or is somehow harnessed through the physical. Or maybe, in a Martixlike possibility which seems like the least likely of them all but is actually just as possible, maybe the physical is just all an illusion with incredible faithfulness and consistency all maintained by consciousness. Or maybe consciousness is itself an illusion. Maybe EVERYTHING is an elaborate illusion!

Because we really have no possible way to investigate them, and because if they are true, the last 3 possibilities are catch-22s - if one of them is the reality then everything we 'know' is complete lies, meaning that even if we would somehow stumble onto undeniable evidence that all of reality as we know it is an illusion, then we're back at square one, or actually square zero, and everything we think we know is actually totally wrong.

This is why it's impractical to consider those possibilities, or I suppose why practical-minded people refuse to consider them. Not sure my wording is quite right, but I mean if we do live in some kind of matrix reality then it seems there's no way we could ever understand anything about it. It's not so likely we'd be able to 'wake up' to a different but somehow completely self-explanatory 'real reality' the way Neo did, in which once he was shown a quick montage he was able to instantly grasp the full truth with no adjustment of parameters. What if all of the universe is just a remarkably consistent dream, with our dreams being myriad little dreams-within-the-dream, an incredibly complicated concept. It adds a layer of massive complexity to a more natural understanding of the universe that already seems very consistent and that each new discovery of science reinforces admirably.

This makes it impossible to conceive of that kind of total illusion concept when you're in rational mode. You have to switch into 'what if' mode, and as I've said before, I find that when I'm in one mode of thought I can no longer understand the other. Maybe that's not quite the right wording again, more like when I'm in one mode my whole paradigm of thinking seems unrelated to the other, as if they're mutually incompatible.

This is why it seems to me that intuitive or experiential truth is incompatible with fact-based understanding. Bible stories that seem to carry powerful meaning when taken metaphorically fall apart completely if understood literally. And if it's all metaphorical, then does that mean God must be understood as metaphor too?

Haha! Timedragon, your post came up while I was writing. But even if it was a typo, I LOVE this... ignostic!! Lol - like we're just too ignorant to understand!

I understand you're agnostic, that's a stance on knowledge, but are your beliefs theist, atheist, or anti-theist? Of course when a person only says agnostic and leaves the rest implied it seems to indicate atheist, a lack of belief one way or the other.

Actually: Ignosticism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I know that agnosticism and atheism aren't mutually exclusive. Ignosticism is just saying that we need to define "god" before we can debate its existence.

Originally Posted by Alric

Exactly, supernatural things don't exit. If God is supernatural then he doesn't exit. If God isn't supernatural, then he isn't a god. If God isn't supernatural then he is acting on all the same rules as everything else in the universe, and so he has no special powers and so can't be considered a God. If a god is just a really advanced alien with a lot of knowledge on how to properly use the rules of the universe to do what he wants to do, then he isn't a god, he is just a really advanced alien. A god without any special powers is never going to be a god, just a life form with advanced knowledge.

I wouldn't rule out the possibility of advanced life forms living in our universe(though I don't believe any have ever visited earth), but just by the definitions a God can't exist.

As a believer in God there is a little rule I always follow by - NEVER LIMIT God. Who am I to say, what God can or cannot do?

Now saying that God cannot act 100% naturally within the realm of science, is a limitation of God. Saying that God can only act by MANIPULATING the laws of physics, is a limitation of God. Further, its simply based on an outdated ideology that God must be separate from reality.

Rather, what you are really saying is 'i dont see evidence that there is a God acting naturally because nature runs itself just fine'. And I wouldn't argue with you on that!! However, this thread isn't about the evidence of God acting in the natural world. But the concept of God.

How can God act in the universe in a 100% natural way without leaving a single supernatural trace? It's simple. Because our science is simply based on what we OBSERVE to be reality. If God has been acting in the natural universe since day one, why would we perceive it to be supernatural? God's activity would be as natural as the weather forecast.


Imagine that the universe is a giant digital program and we are little digital people living in some massive simulation. Now the 'natural laws of physics' for this digital world is all the confusing code built into program. Now when the USER boots up a program, how can those digital people know that a USER who exists outside the program is using it? All they see is code acting on its own!

Sure some might suspect an intelligence behind the code! But others see complex mathematical chaos that we simply can't predict. Either way, when the USER uses the programs, its the natural order of things.

Now a lot of people do see God as some sort of user of a giant digitally simulated universe. (Or a group of super intelligent aliens for some)

But, personally, I don't like this concept of God being a computer user.
1. it places God as SEPARATE from reality, separate from me and you
2. which means this God can't be omnipresent
3. ....which means if you see this God on the road, kill him

The whole message behind buddhas words is, there is no meaning in a God who exists outside of you because that God does not represent or know the truth within you. When it comes to the concept of God - only an omnipresent God matters!!

So a better example of how an omnipresent God can act within reality without breaking a single law of physics - is to see God as a dreamer. This is a more hindu concept of God, brahma's dream.

To understand this concept of God (and why its not supernatural) you only need to understand your own self. Start with your dreams.

Everything in the dream is a manifestation of your subconscious. Nothing in the dream can be separated from your subconscious, therefore your subconscious is literally everywhere you look in the dream. That tree you see, that dream character, all is your subconscious. Your subconscious in the dream is OMNIPRESENT. Your godly subconscious even goes so far as to SPEAK through multiple dream characters simultaneously.

Dreams follow a certain set of 'natural laws'. Natural law number one: what the dreamer expects to happen, happens. Including, unconscious and subconscious expectations. Natural law number two: only what the dreamer focuses on exists. Natural law three: because he sure as hell can't focus his thoughts, nothing is permanent in a dream.

Now as lucid dreamers we change and influence dreams by simply changing our expectation. Did we do anything supernatural? No. Because it's the natural order of dreams to follow the dreamers expectations.

Now if the Universe is Gods dream, then the same logic remains true. God only needs to change Gods expectations of what will happen, and the dream changes. To the dream characters, nothing supernatural took place. Rather the changes that they observe in nature is the way in which nature has always changed. Its natural.

So remember, science is simply what we observe in reality. If reality is a computer simulation, or if a reality is Brahma's dream - then the manner in which God uses or changes nature IS REALITY. We wouldn't observe it as supernatural, we'd observe it as NORMAL.



I know I know I know! A lot of times when a conversation gets to this point the next statements are usually are as follows "well whats the point in believing in a natural God that we could never know of because all of Gods activities are simply observed as natural processes?"

It's a frustrating dilemma isn't? The whole point of the spiritual quest is to not waste our times trying to find a God existing outside of ourselves, that's for religions.

And I realize you were only trying to say God needs special powers to be God. Well that only applies to lesser deities like Zeus, hurling lightning or having bull sex. Special powers is nothing compared to a Supreme Being that encapsulates the whole of reality.

It is interesting you mentioned that since one of the theories people had is that the universe is really a computer simulation. What is ironic is that people have actually found ways to test that hypothesis, and while it seems unlikely they are trying to test it it and find evidence either way. It actually isn't true that a person inside a computer simulation couldn't figure out that they were inside, since we are doing just that.

However, if we were in a computer simulation, the person who programmed the universe wouldn't be a god. It would just be some person from an advanced civilization that knew how to make extremely complex computers. In fact a civilization perhaps a few hundred years more advanced than our own may have the technology to do such a thing.

I really think you might like Meister Eckhart, DarkMatters, if you aren't already familiar with him. Medieval christian mysticism that is philosophically actually very compelling.

I've been hearing arguments for and against the existence of god my whole life, and at this point I guess you could call me an apatheist. Does it really matter if god does or doesn't exist? I feel like all of the effort people put into trying to prove god's existence or lack thereof could be much better spent dealing with issues that are actually relevant to humanity.

I sometimes wonder about a world where no one has ever thought of God before and everyone is properly educated in the scientific reasons for the universe being the way it is. If someone came along and said, "hey, everything that exists was actually created by an all knowing, all powerful being who wants us to do so and so," how many people would actually believe that person? Does the idea of god actually just make sense to some people inherently, or is God just an obsolete explanation for things that we now have better explanations for which people believe in because that's what they've been taught to do? If thinking that the existence of God is logical is an inherent part of some peoples' nature, what's the difference between them and people who don't believe? Or maybe it's inherent in all of us and some of us are just suppressing it. Anyway yeah sorry for the messy post.