[nutronjon]

Originally Posted by ughaibu

For an object to exist, for human beings, that object must be conceivable, and of conceivable objects, for an object to exist in reality it must interact with human beings, either directly or indirectly and without unreasonable exclusivity, eg radio waves exist in reality even though the deaf can not hear radio receivers. So, there are two classes of existing objects, 1) those that exist only in the imagination and 2) those that exist also in reality. As 1) is an unbound over-inclusive class, it is not useful for defining an object's existence, hence, I take 2) to be the class of objects that can meaningfully be described as 'existing'.
God's status would be compromised if god could be named, either distinctly as a known real object or as a member of a class of known real objects. For this point it's relevant that god has been conceived of for 1000s of years, we previously had what were gods but are now volcanoes, thunder, the moon, etc.
An imaginary object can be conceived with complete freedom, but in the case of god this freedom is limited by the possibility of being mundanely re-named, from this it follows that the only constraint on conceptions of god is that such conceptions be outside known reality, and as god can not be part of any reality that can ever be known, god can not exist. That is to say, god can be absolutely anything that can not be named as an existing thing, so, non-existence is the only essential property of god.

Until your last line, I thought we had agreement. What is the argument for God being separate from what is? I think it is more this....

God in Buddhism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Tibetan adept, Dolpopa, writes: "It is absolute, never relative. It is the true nature ... It is gnosis, never consciousness. It is pure, never impure. It is a sublime Self, never a nothingness ... It is Buddha, never a sentient being." (The Buddha from Dolpo, Cyrus Stearns, SUNY, New York, 1999, pp. 149-150). The Tibetan Sangpa Kagyu school of Buddhism speaks of the Ultimate Reality as pure, spotless, changeless Mind that is present in all things, all times and in all beings and which can never die. Kalu Rinpoche elucidates: " ... pure mind cannot be located, but it is omnipresent and all-penetrating; it embraces and pervades all things. Moreover, it is beyond change, and its open nature is indestructible and atemporal."

[nutronjon]

Originally Posted by HydrogenBond

Where do dreams fits into reality? Everyone has had dreams so there is plenty of data to show that the dream phenomena exists. The firing of neurons during dreams is not much different than when we observe physical reality. The only major difference is the dream affect does not use the sensory systems, but it can use the rest of the brain's wiring to get the same affect. Dreams exist in that transition area, where things can appear real without existing. In dreams we have an observer for what appears to be real without being real.

Dreams show that things do not have to exist in physical reality to create the affect they are real. If someone had an hallucination, it would appear real without actually existing. Theoretically, if we could tweak the brain, by-passing the sensory systems, one could create a perception of real without it being in physical reality. Say the brain was an antenna and could pick up quantum signals. The dream would be real at the quantum level but not exactly real the way we expect it to be.

This sounds like an argument for some good drugs.

I met a woman who is schizophrenic, and this manifested for her as hallucinations. She saw an elephant nose on her boss, and knew this could not be real, but what she saw is what she saw. I can not comprehend her experience and the difficulty she had, struggling with her own mind to distinguish between reality and hallucenations. We take how our brains work, and therefore, our concept of of reality, too much for granted.

Curiously people using mushrooms can experience the same hallucination. How unreal can that be?

I am so thankful for a discussion that is progressive, instead of stuck on point one. The idea of information as quantum packets, is exiting, and brings the question about God, to a question about what is real?

[InfiniteNow]

Nutronjon,

The point is that if god can be uniquely named it is no longer god.

Person A: "Hey, that's god."
Person B: "No, that's a table."

The moment that you call it something else, the concept of god is no longer required.

I have read many more of ughaibu's supporting posts on this idea, and I think he's very logically reached his conclusion that:

"Non-existence is god's only necessary property."


Check more out here (as linked in post #4 this thread) for why (be sure to read all the way through to maximize understanding):

Arguments against god[list] - Page 2 - IIDB

[REASON]

Originally Posted by nutronjon

Until your last line, I thought we had agreement. What is the argument for God being separate from what is? I think it is more this....

nutronjon,

I will ask you again the same question I have asked you in other threads, and which is also completely relevant to this thread. So far, you have yet to offer your opinion other than to direct everyone to the writings of Cicero or Thomas Jefferson.

What is the significance of determining that nature is God? What does it mean?

[modest]

Originally Posted by ughaibu

This has been skeletonised for clarity as:
1) any thing in nature can be observed, measured and uniquely named
2) god cant be observed, measured and uniquely named
3) that which cant be observed, measured or named can be imagined
4) there are no restrictions on what can be imagined
5) by 1+2+4: the only restriction on how god is imagined, is that god be not part of nature
6) all things that relevantly exist are part of nature
7) by 5+6: the only essential property of god is non-existence

Very interesting reasoning ughaibu. I would agree with your conclusion, but I'm afraid I have some small problems with your postulates three and four. Number three is:

3) that which can't be observed, measured or named can be imagined

which would be true if number four were true:

4) there are no restrictions on what can be imagined

However, these cannot be true if counter examples exist. For instance, it seems impossible for a hypercube, hypersphere, or any 4D object to be imagined. The smartest and most capable Einsteins and Hawkings have been incapable of envisioning something with four or more spatial dimensions. I would therefore say there ARE restrictions on what can be imagined opposed to #4 and by extension #3.

Some synthetic, a priori, metaphysical descriptions can be imagined and some cannot. Perhaps a hypercube cannot exist in our reality and our inability to visualize it is an effect of that fact. I can't prove or support that or even relate it to the god concept. But, I find it really, really fascinating. It also seems relevant to religion by your idea of what is possible to exist and what must not exist. I'll have to think about this some more

-modest

[ughaibu]

Modest: Thanks for the crit. I agree, those lines, and maybe others, need rewording or explaining.

[paigetheoracle]

Originally Posted by ughaibu

For an object to exist, for human beings, that object must be conceivable, and of conceivable objects, for an object to exist in reality it must interact with human beings, either directly or indirectly and without unreasonable exclusivity, eg radio waves exist in reality even though the deaf can not hear radio receivers. So, there are two classes of existing objects, 1) those that exist only in the imagination and 2) those that exist also in reality. As 1) is an unbound over-inclusive class, it is not useful for defining an object's existence, hence, I take 2) to be the class of objects that can meaningfully be described as 'existing'.
God's status would be compromised if god could be named, either distinctly as a known real object or as a member of a class of known real objects. For this point it's relevant that god has been conceived of for 1000s of years, we previously had what were gods but are now volcanoes, thunder, the moon, etc.
An imaginary object can be conceived with complete freedom, but in the case of god this freedom is limited by the possibility of being mundanely re-named, from this it follows that the only constraint on conceptions of god is that such conceptions be outside known reality, and as god can not be part of any reality that can ever be known, god can not exist. That is to say, god can be absolutely anything that can not be named as an existing thing, so, non-existence is the only essential property of god.

Not non-existent but subjective as opposed to objective, potential as opposed to actual, energy as opposed to matter (soul comes into this as well, using the analogy of a volcano - what is known (solid), is the external cone, consisting of layers of what was (The past) as lava is undifferentiated, unsettled and alive (unprejudiced, unformed, innocent, new) i.e. what is and what could be).

To say God is non-existent is to miss the point. It would be fairer to say God is the ignored, the marginalized, the outsider in present day reality. It is also to call it the mystery that draws us all on, into the world and even leads to procreation. As for Einstein, he called it the creative power that leads to art and even science, so negate it if you want but that doesn't make your denial of this power correct and remember that denial is a symptom of addiction and why it continues. Imagination leads to exploration, denial leads to holding onto a limited perspective.

Science is now proudly atheistic where once it was proudly faith driven ("Cosmic Religious feeling is the strongest and noblest incitement to scientific research" Einstein). Desire led us here as denial stops us letting go and moving on (fear of death/ change). The phobia of returning to the childhood stage of wonder and innocence (having nothing, knowing nothing is what we fear most as adults - no status, wealth, power just spiritual or free energy as opposed to materialism (bound attention on matter 'It's mine!' - constipated and stagnant civilization, trying to maintain past glory ('Remember thou art mortal') and holding onto dear life, for fear of a second childhood, like a dizzy schoolboy on a merry-go-round. Understand the condition - don't condemn it: 'Nobody gets out of here alive' Jim Morrison ('We're all going to die!'/ 'Look on my works and despair' Ozymandias by Shelley).