What If God Was Real And Manifested Proving It?

EgonSpengler said:
Hoax. Stage magicians backed by a billionaire.


Extraterrestrials using advanced nanotech so they can speak to all of humanity simultaneously without showing favoritism to any one Human culture is a more plausible hypothesis to explain that than God.
Click to expand...
You can certainly claim such events as hoaxes, but demonstrating the sources of the hoax might be difficult. To say "Oh it can't be god, because I can think of another explanation." fails on the merits. The idea is that any god who in some fashion proclaimed itself to all the world to be god, would then demonstrate its power. Raising the Titanic or unifying world languages into one tongue would be ways to demonstrate power that might well impress a lot of skeptics.
Valka D'Ur said:
It would have to engage everyone. As in EVERYONE. Atheists and scientists included. ALL religious faiths would have to experience it the same way and reach the same conclusions.

It's an all-or-nothing.

You know there are some people who wouldn't believe it to be the real Titanic unless Jack and Rose were on it. ;)

As for undoing Babel, there's no evidence that it ever existed. And having only one language would be not only boring, but annoying. What use would people in the Sahara have for the multiple expressions for cold-weather phenomena? I get puzzled reactions from some Americans when I talk about wet snow and dry snow and how snow smells.
Click to expand...
The issue is not whether or not the Tower of Babel existed. Use of "Babel" was to point to the diversity of world languages and then have god undo that with a swipe of the hand. Boring or annoying is not the point either. We are looking for a way to demonstrate godly power in a convincing manner. That is all. What you would think about a universal language is irrelevant.
 
Birdjaguar said:
You can certainly claim such events as hoaxes, but demonstrating the sources of the hoax might be difficult. To say "Oh it can't be god, because I can think of another explanation." fails on the merits. The idea is that any god who in some fashion proclaimed itself to all the world to be god, would then demonstrate its power. Raising the Titanic or unifying world languages into one tongue would be ways to demonstrate power that might well impress a lot of skeptics.

The issue is not whether or not the Tower of Babel existed. Use of "Babel" was to point to the diversity of world languages and then have god undo that with a swipe of the hand. Boring or annoying is not the point either. We are looking for a way to demonstrate godly power in a convincing manner. That is all. What you would think about a universal language is irrelevant.
Click to expand...

I tend to look at much of the world through the lens of anthropology and archaeology. What evidence has been found to prove that the Tower of Babel story in the Old Testament really happened?

None I'm aware of. I'm pretty sure that if it had been proven, there would have been a mention in the news somewhere.

Nope. So before you can convince me that it can be undone, you're going to have to convince me that it happened in the first place.

I doubt that will ever happen.

As for everyone speaking the same language, different groups of people develop different vocabulary for the same thing. For instance, I used the abbreviation "DL" once at TrekBBS to refer to someone with two accounts, and the people there had no clue what I was talking about. They use a different term.
 
:sigh: Babel was a stand in for the diversity of world languages. Undoing Babel is just a way of saying the the diversity of language was reversed leaving a single language understood and spoken by all. As someone who writes a lot, you need to be less literal. Write more poetry. :p

The thread topic is god working giant miracles to prove itself. Anecdotes about subculture use of vocabulary is irrelevant.
 
Birdjaguar said:
:sigh: Babel was a stand in for the diversity of world languages. Undoing Babel is just a way of saying the the diversity of language was reversed leaving a single language understood and spoken by all. As someone who writes a lot, you need to be less literal. Write more poetry. :p

The thread topic is god working giant miracles to prove itself. Anecdotes about subculture use of vocabulary is irrelevant.
Click to expand...

Tower of Babel is a parable to me. Might have elements of truth in it if slaves were used to raise the ziggurats in Sumeria.
 
Last edited:
Zardnaar said:
I mentioned the ten commandments treat them as commands.

Rest of it where does God start vs cultural mores at the time.
Click to expand...
the second sentence of yours is incomprehensible. i think you say the ten commandments can be trusted, the rest can't? we don't even know if moses existed.

the torah, bible and qur'an are both written by humans. a lot of the material is supposedly founded in revelation, but there are a plethora of edits, and a lot of it was second hand (and some would argue that mohammad was politically motivated). you literally can't trust anything in them to be god's word unless god actually shows up and tells you what to think.

if the big sky reveal or whatever is just a reveal, with no instruction, we're basically left off where we started. i guess punishment irl would make some sort of weird scientific method possible, where we could test things and then reliable figure out whether we'd be smited. like if some people reliably punch a baby and get struck by lightning.
 
Angst said:
the second sentence of yours is incomprehensible. i think you say the ten commandments can be trusted, the rest can't? we don't even know if moses existed.

the torah, bible and qur'an are both written by humans. a lot of the material is supposedly founded in revelation, but there are a plethora of edits, and a lot of it was second hand (and some would argue that mohammad was politically motivated). you literally can't trust anything in them to be god's word unless god actually shows up and tells you what to think.

if the big sky reveal or whatever is just a reveal, with no instruction, we're basically left off where we started. i guess punishment irl would make some sort of weird scientific method possible, where we could test things and then reliable figure out whether we'd be smited. like if some people reliably punch a baby and get struck by lightning.
Click to expand...

Damn that's bad lol stupid phone.

If the holy books are somewhat right we can figure out who would be screwed (everyone not XYZ obeying the rules).

More after what cfc woukd think if an omnipotent being who can and will enforce their desires at a level we can't imagine.
 
Birdjaguar said:
:sigh: Babel was a stand in for the diversity of world languages. Undoing Babel is just a way of saying the the diversity of language was reversed leaving a single language understood and spoken by all. As someone who writes a lot, you need to be less literal. Write more poetry. :p

The thread topic is god working giant miracles to prove itself. Anecdotes about subculture use of vocabulary is irrelevant.
Click to expand...

Birdjaguar, how about doing me the favor of realizing that I'm not stupid, and that I have my own take on how the world does and doesn't work, 'k? :huh:

I've read both testaments. Diversity of language can be a beautiful thing when it's not used as a political weapon. There are so many ways humans and other life on Earth have to express ourselves, and I would not take it as any sort of "miracle" if we were all limited to a single language.

If you find my posts "irrelevant" then feel free not to read them.
 
Zardnaar said:
Damn that's bad lol stupid phone.

If the holy books are somewhat right we can figure out who would be screwed (everyone not XYZ obeying the rules).

More after what cfc woukd think if an omnipotent being who can and will enforce their desires at a level we can't imagine.
Click to expand...
i'd argue that the omnipotent being that does just whatever it wants is reality as it is. of course excepting that it's not a being, and it seems to be not too arbitrary as to its functioning. reality seem to follow along its projected order as per consequence. but it definitely is morally arbitrary when it comes to suffering. the point is that knowing that a god is behind the universe, and knowing nothing else, changes nothing about the world. since then the god is just the function behind causality, and nothing further can be divined about reality than what we're already doing. so it changes nothing. we don't know the god's desire until the god communicates it either in word, confirmation of biblical word or whatever, or projects strict enforcement. if the god then judges us in the afterlife, we literally can't know that as is, and know in life what it will judge us for, since we have no access to the afterlife.

the holy books can't be shown as somewhat right until it's ... shown. none of the miracles have been reproduced, and are written by second hand people (or rather, third-, fourth-, fifth-hand observers), if not outright founded in myth. the caliphate eventually fell. we can't know whether the holy books are somewhat right.

i'll just ask: are you superficially acquainted with bible history? it's a mess. jumbled together accounts edited to the Nth degree. plethora of translation errors. god showing up without doing anything else would not convince any rational person to read up on the schlock that is the king james' bible, or whatever's used in NZ/america/whatever. there's other hypothetical gods that could create a skylight show or a burning bush. there's other mythologies in the world. it could be god damn Eru Ilúvatar. note that in the bible, even, on a god damn basic level of scrutiny in the hypothetical situation - every revelation of sorts was communicated to the prophets. a god showing up not doing that would be highly suspect as to the legitimacy of the scriptures.

if your question in this thread boils down to "what would cfc do if god exists" i'd wager most nonreligious users here would just go "nothing" because that hypothetical, following nothing beyond that, is literally how the world is lived by most atheists and agnostics.

if you have the god then actively communicating in some way, either in words or punishment, we can reflect more on that.
 
Angst said:
i'd argue that the omnipotent being that does just whatever it wants is reality as it is. of course excepting that it's not a being, and it seems to be not too arbitrary as to its functioning. reality seem to follow along its projected order as per consequence. but it definitely is morally arbitrary when it comes to suffering. the point is that knowing that a god is behind the universe, and knowing nothing else, changes nothing about the world. since then the god is just the function behind causality, and nothing further can be divined about reality than what we're already doing. so it changes nothing. we don't know the god's desire until the god communicates it either in word, confirmation of biblical word or whatever, or projects strict enforcement. if the god then judges us in the afterlife, we literally can't know that as is, and know in life what it will judge us for, since we have no access to the afterlife.

the holy books can't be shown as somewhat right until it's ... shown. none of the miracles have been reproduced, and are written by second hand people (or rather, third-, fourth-, fifth-hand observers), if not outright founded in myth. the caliphate eventually fell. we can't know whether the holy books are somewhat right.

i'll just ask: are you superficially acquainted with bible history? it's a mess. jumbled together accounts edited to the Nth degree. plethora of translation errors. god showing up without doing anything else would not convince any rational person to read up on the schlock that is the king james' bible, or whatever's used in NZ/america/whatever. there's other hypothetical gods that could create a skylight show or a burning bush. there's other mythologies in the world. it could be god damn Eru Ilúvatar. note that in the bible, even, on a god damn basic level of scrutiny in the hypothetical situation - every revelation of sorts was communicated to the prophets. a god showing up not doing that would be highly suspect as to the legitimacy of the scriptures.

if your question in this thread boils down to "what would cfc do if god exists" i'd wager most nonreligious users here would just go "nothing" because that hypothetical, following nothing beyond that, is literally how the world is lived by most atheists and agnostics.

if you have the god then actively communicating in some way, either in words or punishment, we can reflect more on that.
Click to expand...

I'm aware of the bibles history broadly speaking. Missing books, translations etc and Judaism sort of dating from the Babylonia era.

Note I'm not Christian or whatever it's all horse hockey for me. But if God turned up and said that's right deal with it or else erm gulp.
 
Zardnaar said:
I'm aware of the bibles history broadly speaking. Missing books, translations etc and Judaism sort of dating from the Babylonia era.

Note I'm not Christian or whatever it's all horse hockey for me. But if God turned up and said that's right deal with it or else erm gulp.
Click to expand...
ok. but yea, if god just shows up, means nothing. if god shows up and tells us what to do, means something.
 
Angst said:
ok. but yea, if god just shows up, means nothing. if god shows up and tells us what to do, means something.
Click to expand...

Well at the least odds are the death penalty is fine and something similar to ten commandments.
 
Angst said:
the odds really aren't, no. i have no idea why you'd think so.
Click to expand...

I did say God would resemble the old testament Gid along with the ability to enforce their claims.

This means angels of death, pillars of salt and destruction of cities and nations if need be.
 
Last edited:
Zardnaar said:
I did say God woukd resemble the old testament Gid along with the ability to enforce their claims.

This means angels of death, pillars of salt and destruction of cities and nations if need be.
Click to expand...
i'd really like you to properly outline what the god would say and do. the vagueness of the outline is a real problem. if half of the old testament is true, but the other half is false, like, he may just have done the ten plagues for fun. old testament god varies from tribal war god (esp in its mythological origins, and actually not originally monotheistic... just the god of that people) to lovecraftian indifferent demon deity. like, a big point of the old testament (at least at the time of jesus for example) is that the jews are the chosen people and screw everyone else they suck. so god creating providence could be to just instanuke everyone else, depending on whatever the hell this revelation of yours supposedly entails. like - again - WHICH old testament? the damn king james' bible version? some modern jewish interpretation? the mythological origin where he leads his people against other peoples (and their gods) on earth?
 
If the entity is serious about being taken as a god, the best route likely would be to flamboyantly murder any prominent non-believers. The rest will quickly fall to some type of double-think, even if they don't honestly believe it to be a god.
On the off-chance that it's not merely using advanced tech, it likely would be a being which while comparatively to humans has many more abilities, is itself just an alien.

There is no way to prove you are a god. Regardless if you are a god or not.

As for it being specifically the OT/NT god or tied, I can't even take such a prospect seriously, unless it was a scam from the start (non-deity being convinced humans it was a god, now returned because...it wanted more love/fear from the ants?)
 
Last edited:
Angst said:
i'd really like you to properly outline what the god would say and do. the vagueness of the outline is a real problem. if half of the old testament is true, but the other half is false, like, he may just have done the ten plagues for fun. old testament god varies from tribal war god (esp in its mythological origins, and actually not originally monotheistic... just the god of that people) to lovecraftian indifferent demon deity. like, a big point of the old testament (at least at the time of jesus for example) is that the jews are the chosen people and screw everyone else they suck. so god creating providence could be to just instanuke everyone else, depending on whatever the hell this revelation of yours supposedly entails. like - again - WHICH old testament? the damn king james' bible version? some modern jewish interpretation? the mythological origin where he leads his people against other peoples (and their gods) on earth?
Click to expand...
I said broadly speaking God is more similar to Old testament, Torah and Koran.

Basically could be angry, vengeful God if need be.

I didn't want to bog things down bickering over specifics or are the books God's will or filtered through those cultures.

Basically attributing the divine power to God while the more cultural aspects bit more vague to avoid arguments over who's right.

God's here, has power and is willing to use it to prove it is the main point. Woukd you obey if their dictates violate your personal beliefs whatever they are.

Maybe judge not lest be judged yourself is very important idk.
 
Zardnaar said:
Ots more what woukd you do if the commands were more 1500-2500 years ago.
Click to expand...
My phone made those numbers a link and when I clicked it offered to call that number
 
Zardnaar said:
I said broadly speaking God is more similar to Old testament, Torah and Koran.

Basically could be angry, vengeful God if need be.

I didn't want to bog things down bickering over specifics or are the books God's will or filtered through those cultures.

Basically attributing the divine power to God while the more cultural aspects bit more vague to avoid arguments over who's right.

God's here, has power and is willing to use it to prove it is the main point. Woukd you obey if their dictates violate your personal beliefs whatever they are.

Maybe judge not lest be judged yourself is very important idk.
Click to expand...

No, if its claiming to be responsible for everything its got some explaining to do.
The initial set-up was a botched job and its been AWOL for the last 2000 years.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom