Re: What could motivate a god?

Mark this claim" I am not Trolling and have no intention to crosspost",
which is unethically and without justification made by you as an atheist
(ie. a Godless person) to a Christian discussion forum, if your posting
history of 12 Nov 2003 is anything to go by, suggests your posting is a
troll, "Christians and other Monotheists think pagan gods are petty
creatures unworthy of worship - like Sauron - and that God - Yahweh - Allah
is a different order of being altogether.  (why liking one god more than
another makes it any more real - is another topic itself)" [Atheist Mark
Richardson [EMAIL PROTECTED] on alt.religion.christian on 3
December, 2003]

- dolf
- <http://www.users.bigpond.net.au/telos/kabbalah/vkabbalah.html>

From: Mark Richardson [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Newsgroups: alt.atheism,talk.atheism,alt.recovery.religion
Subject: Re: A Question for Atheists About Charity Organizations.

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[snipped for context]

(Which is why I avoid christian charities - I want to know the money
is being spent on helping people - not converting them )

Mark.

--
Mark Richardson mDOTrichardsonATutasDOTeduDOTau

Member of S.M.A.S.H.
(Sarcastic Middle aged  Atheists with a Sense of Humour)

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"Mark Richardson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]

The topic arises occasionally but often obliquely in religious
discussion - I would like an actual thread and get other peoples
thoughts on this one.

(I originally posted this essay on alt.atheism - "preaching to the
un-converted" you might say -  but I wanted to hear if christians have
something interesting to say. I am not Trolling and have no intention
to crosspost - genuinely interested in hearing your views.)
So here it is.
------------------------------

Gods are described by mythology as willful beings - they *want* people
to behave in a certain way so they bribe, threaten, send dreams and
visions to get their way.
The God of the OT or the Homeric gods being classic examples - very
active, meddlesome, willful, vengeful - pleased and displeased with
mortals behavior.

Then there is the "philosophers God" - remote, abstract, perfect -
Aristotle's "unmoved mover".

Somehow these two are supposed to be the one and the same thing -
which I think is a perfectly insane idea.

Depending on the individual believer, their version of God fits
somewhere on the broad spectrum from active to passive - from the
fundamentalist God that watches very closely what every person on the
planet does with their sexual organs and judges them accordingly to
the remote and disinterested Deist God.

First let me deal briefly with one extreme of this spectrum.
To me a god has to be a being with a will - Gravity isn't a god - even
though it is powerful and omnipresent and eternal - it treats a gram
of matter the same whether it is living or dead or good or evil - it
never "decides" to behave one way and not another - so a purely
impersonal and uninvolved "god" isn't a god at all as far as I am
concerned - its a force of nature - like gravity.
(Or for an example in philosophical thought -  the Tao isn't a god.)

This is related to the idea of worship - there is no point in
"worshiping" or "believing in" a being that has no will - if it cannot
react to your praise and send you to paradise or smite your enemies
then there is literally no point in worshiping such a being.

So a god - at least one that I need consider - must have will.

A rain god needs the right sort of worship - prayers and sacrifices -
or he will become angry and not send the rains and people will starve.

Or

God needs us to worship his son Jesus (not his real name) or he will
not reward us with eternal life in paradise.

Why?

What could motivate a god to *want* things from us and to reward or
punish us?

Think about Sauron in "Lord of the RIngs" - he wants to destroy
everything beautiful and noble and corrupt the world and fill it with
his hate and malice.
What's his motivation?

In the case of petty gods - like Sauron - they have histories - they
have personal stories - they have suffered pain and regret and have
felt envy and rage and a desire for vengeance.
The motivations of Sauron are the motivations of mortals - he is like
Stalin or Mao Tse Tung but with great supernatural power - he is ruled
by his human pettiness and frailties - he has great power but the
emotional stability of a 2 year old having a tantrum.

Christians and other Monotheists think pagan gods are petty creatures
unworthy of worship - like Sauron - and that God - Yahweh - Allah is a
different order of being altogether.
 (why liking one god more than another makes it any more real - is
another topic itself)

But they cant have it both ways - if they reject the idea that their
god is a petty creature motivated by mere human emotions and desire -
then what motivates them?

Don't know? It's a mystery? Never asked yourself the question?
Well I am asking...
What *could* *possibly* motivate an eternal, all powerful, all knowing
being?
What could possibly motivate a being such as this to move - to act -
to desire some outcome?

The whole notion of God falls apart on this question.

God has no reason to ever say "let their be light" - we never have to
look beyond Genesis chapter one  - the story fails right there.
We never even have to think about "evidence" or "proof" or anything
along those lines.

Mark. (Feeling very much like a Strong Atheist today).


--
Mark Richardson mDOTrichardsonATutasDOTeduDOTau

Member of S.M.A.S.H.
(Sarcastic Middle aged  Atheists with a Sense of Humour)

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