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Politics : Should God be replaced? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: J. C. Dithers who wrote (11349)	2/28/2002 3:11:41 PM
From: TigerPaw	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 28931

why does "God" seem so implausible to some? It's not that it's so implausible that there might be other lifeforms or that they might be sufficiently advanced. The portion of the God story that conflicts with the properties of our universe is the idea of anything having enough control to overcome chaos and randomness without having a universe so deterministic that the future is already ordained. In other words, it is the idea of a plan that is not possible, not the idea of a being. TP

To: J. C. Dithers who wrote (11349)	2/28/2002 3:22:52 PM
From: Mitch Blevins	Respond to of 28931

>>If so, though, why does "God" seem so implausible to some?<< "Supernatural" beings as you describe them, meaning alien beings with characteristics beyond human understanding do not seem totally implausible to me. It is when we get into the particulars that skepticism arises. For example, would these supernatural beings: come to earth; communicate to the people through trances in some wandering goat-herders; promise these goat-herders that they will have their nation restored and a kingdom of glory established for them; send one of their own and have him killed; raise him from the dead (along with many others); promise the humans that any who believe in this dead/resurrected alien will live forever; etc... This is fantasy. It is a silly as the stories of Hercules or Mithra or Isis. And your scenario doesn't address the superlative aspects of God (omniscience, omnipotence, etc) that are incompatible with an advanced alien race. Unless we believe all the supernatural stories/myths out there, we have to admit to ourselves that humans have a tendency to make up wild stuff like this. Now how likely is it that humans like to make up crazy stories, but the one crazy story you or I like is actually true and caused by supernatural aliens? Hmmmm...

To: J. C. Dithers who wrote (11349)	2/28/2002 3:53:26 PM
From: Rambi	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 28931

(remember "The Thing"? -- I believe it was a based on a real incident <gg>) The Thing actually originated in my refrigerator, erupting from the unholy union of some leftover chili and a spinach casserole. Nothing was safe during its reign of terror. Small grapes rolled screaming to their death on the floor. Bottles of dressing shook on their shelves. Decent God-fearing leftovers cowered in their Tupperware and prayed to be removed before the Thing could invade their tiny homes and ingest them into its slimy amoeboid self. I struck a pact with the devil Hollywood that if they would remove The Thing from my refrigerator, I would relinquish all copyright claims. And now you know the truth. (I too wish only the best for you, JC!)