God Is An Atheist

[tana]

Holygram.

Holy cleverness Batman.

[tana]

According to you, forces are "substances". Good luck with that one.

Not sure which post you inferred that from M. The whole point of this thread is my attempts to theorize that consciousness can not be made of substance.....It must be more similar to a force, which is immeasurable, and has no substance, except by measuring how it moves particles.

It seems like LDS theory tries to take an essence of awareness and make it tactile. As if an entity is a box of thoughts....a recipe. This soul is one part flour/integrity, one part yeast/ambition...One part sugar/goodness. To me it is impossible to locate who could be the baker, where these parts were mixed and how they could be tangible.

[CV75]

But isn't fueling itself calling in an outside force?

How can a particle ever move itself.....it is a point with no dimensions. It would need feet, feathers or flippers.....and intelligence. But it has no structure or mechanism. It is indivisible and mindless. It is not measurable by its length or breadth....only by the amount of force it takes to move it. It has never been seen by a human eye, we only see it as a representation of the trail it leaves on an instrument....Its history. Particles never touch each other. It would take an infinite amount of energy to overcome the electrostatic repulsion....I think.

The trouble with calling in Tarski for help here is he would probably poke as many holes in my story as yours.....

Tarski: Are particles movers and shakers in and of themselves....or must there be a separate force?

Sorry I'm late on this, as I am caring for an elderly relative (and will be all this week). But since my approach to this is more intuitive and imaginative than scientific, perhaps some particles have properties that do not act like particles at all, or are masked/invisible/cloaked as particles and follow other laws that can still impact or interact with those laws we are familiar with.

[tana]

I just see so many problems with the challenge of putting this essence of an entity in a petri dish and measuring it.

First, if this core set of ingredients has already existed for a bunch of eternity as is, How there could be a *happening* (which would put them on a linear course) in their eternal existence, which was by an undefined *higher power* (making them unequals) declared that they are now responsible for these ingredients that they had no hand in creating?

Second, if these traits are made of substance, and a core can be defined by its ingredients, and cores cannot change....(How can they?) what would be the point in putting them thru paces and testing them when god could just determine their worth on the spot?

Third, if spirit particles behave anything like temporal particles, God can't see them. He can only assess/measure their history. (Heisenberg uncertainty principle) It would be like judging 'Dancing with the stars' from a still photograph. If souls truly do have free will, and can have an un-mechanical thought for no reason whatsoever, they could change their behavour immediately subsequent to god deeming them nonredeemable.

[SearchDog]

According to LDS doctrine, God is a spaceman.

I must have missed that lesson in Gospel Principles class.

Neither can "God is an Atheist" since that would mean He does not believe in Himself.

[tana]

I must have missed that lesson in Gospel Principles class.

Neither can "God is an Atheist" since that would mean He does not believe in Himself.

Did you see post # 140?

'God (must be) an Atheist' is the conclusion I come to based upon my personal observations of the premises the LDS worldview supplies.

[SearchDog]

I understand. I apologise for using the term spaceman.

If I were to replace 'spaceman' with 'scientist'....I think possibly this may be less offensive, but in my mind it has god just as pigeonholed.

If God is a scientist, he will never be master of his domain. He will always be a product of it.

For God to be more than this he must not be bound by physical laws of motion. He must be able to create anything imaginable from his imagination without a chain of events before this thought or after.

I simply don't agree with your conclusion made in post #140.

God is not bound by physical laws of motion. He speaks and the cosmos obeys. It is God's motion (even His breath) which spins up galaxies.

Edited April 1, 2012 by SearchDog

[SearchDog]

Did you see post # 140?

'God (must be) an Atheist' is the conclusion I come to based upon my personal observations of the premises the LDS worldview supplies.

Perhaps your personal observations are limited by a lack of truly understanding what Mormons teach.

[CV75]

I just see so many problems with the challenge of putting this essence of an entity in a petri dish and measuring it.

Exactly! You have to “be” for who you are, not for what you might think everything else might be, or for what you even know it is. This is love, and we experience it in degrees. This is so even / especially for those who have found God. That exp-lains my approach to all this.

First, if this core set of ingredients has already existed for a bunch of eternity as is, How there could be a *happening* (which would put them on a linear course) in their eternal existence, which was by an undefined *higher power* (making them unequals) declared that they are now responsible for these ingredients that they had no hand in creating?

God is more of a facilitator than a dictator, so love and agency prevail over all.

Second, if these traits are made of substance, and a core can be defined by its ingredients, and cores cannot change....(How can they?) what would be the point in putting them thru paces and testing them when god could just determine their worth on the spot?

While God can determine our worth on the spot (D&C 18:10), aspects of our existence is a series of spots and His plan is “to see if [we] will do” according to His plan of happiness at each subsequent spot along the way (Abraham 3:25), which He lovingly facilitates and to which we apply our agency. The "final judgement" is diffrent than His assessment of our worth.

Third, if spirit particles behave anything like temporal particles, God can't see them. He can only assess/measure their history. (Heisenberg uncertainty principle) It would be like judging 'Dancing with the stars' from a still photograph. If souls truly do have free will, and can have an un-mechanical thought for no reason whatsoever, they could change their behavour immediately subsequent to god deeming them nonredeemable.

I think God can see spiritual particles, without changing the behavior of those that can act, or that are already acted upon by someone else in such a way that He cannot or does not act upon them / change their behavior. I also think that ultimately, any thought has a reason (right or wrong, or in being more an explanation than a reason). Changing some thoughts and behaviors requires facilitation when inherent ability is lacking, but that is an agreed-upon arrangement between the Helper and the one helped, and based on love and agency.