What if there is a God and that God is perfect?...

[bfiddy100]

So why would a perfect entity need to be worshiped in the first place? A god that can create every conceivable condition and situation created one where a chaotic and largely destructive, short term entity (us) live under a set of conditions that are largely contradictory and honestly don't seem to have any real long term goals at all? Short term life-die- got to heaven, exist eternally yada yada. Sounds pointless to me. Don't personally see a master plan in that.

Or else god doesn't exist and we invented him. Makes way more sense.

Excellent question.  You are right that the perfect God doesn't need to be worshipped.  However, the perfect God does love what is good and right perfectly and therefore He requires us to worship Him because it is good and right to worship that which is infinitely worthy of worship (i.e., the perfect God).  The master plan is for God to show what He is like.  If God is perfect it is good and right for Him to show His attributes.   

[Baruch]

G-d has shown himself in the events of this world ... and I remain unimpressed.  This is what I mean by ... I know G-d personally.  I have a handle metaphysically as well, but it is this personal disgust that frames it most for me.  A god who is only theological, is just word salad.

I am irreligious because while a theist I am also a freethinker.  But I am also irreligious because I don't revere G-d, and because at this time congregational worship isn't doing anything for me.  At times it has, and it may again.

[bfiddy100]

No!  What you fail to see in your infinite willful blindness and ignorance is that you are worshiping something that does not and cannot exist.  But you refuse to even think that.  You even refuse to think, for what you do is believe.  And that lets you off the hook form the thinking part.  You and reasons, facts and thinking are things you don't want to consider.  You buy into a fairy land of absurd beings and propositions.  But you buy into it hook, line and sinker.  That way you don't have to reason and think--just believe.  It is soooooo much easier that way.  I do pity you.

Huh, this is a strange response.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like you prefer to just insult me instead of think through my arguments and address them.  You exalt thinking and reasoning, and yet you do none of it in your response.  Are you able to refute my argument and show where the error is? 

[bfiddy100]

I hate to break this to you, but your cartoon god and his cartoon creation is the picture perfect poster child for 'amoral'.  What a blind fool you are!!!!

Again, I fail to see any reasoning behind your insults and assertions.  God hates evil and loves good and acts consistently with that hatred and love.  That is the exact opposite of amoral. 

[Baruch]

Again, I fail to see any reasoning behind your insults and assertions.  God hates evil and loves good and acts consistently with that hatred and love.  That is the exact opposite of amoral.

If you were correct, you would be right.  But you are a rationalist ... and reality is empiricist.

[stromboli]

Excellent question.  You are right that the perfect God doesn't need to be worshipped.  However, the perfect God does love what is good and right perfectly and therefore He requires us to worship Him because it is good and right to worship that which is infinitely worthy of worship (i.e., the perfect God).  The master plan is for God to show what He is like.  If God is perfect it is good and right for Him to show His attributes.   

What is the point to "love" when by all accounts god contains or understands every iota of existence? Love connotes an external expression towards something, as opposed to loving oneself which seems narcissistic at best. All the "good" and "right" are human concepts, as are god's attributes. A perfect god doesn't need to describe himself to himself. If we as humans need to love him, what aspect of a perfect being are we fulfilling? Makes no sense. If he needs to be loved he is not perfect, but lacking that component. If he had to create us just to be loved or worshiped, then he is anything but a perfect being, but is instead a vain and needful one.

And god is still a personification of men's projected ideas and still a fabrication.

[Mike Cl]

Huh, this is a strange response.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like you prefer to just insult me instead of think through my arguments and address them.  You exalt thinking and reasoning, and yet you do none of it in your response.  Are you able to refute my argument and show where the error is?

There are no 'arguments' for your beliefs.  There are beliefs for you beliefs.  And I've heard all that crap before.  To have an argument or discussion, one needs to have some reasons, some facts to deal with.  In your world of a belief in a thing in which there is no evidence does not allow us to have a discussion or argument.  I could insert the name 'The Invisible Pink Unicorn' and make the same 'arguments' you do.  And you could not 'prove' me wrong. The error you seek is that you believe in a fiction and you think your faith makes it so.  I may as well try to dissuade a person who sincerely believes that Mickey Mouse is a real being.  Your sincerely held beliefs hold absolutely no shred of facts or reasoning in them. 

[Mike Cl]

Again, I fail to see any reasoning behind your insults and assertions.  God hates evil and loves good and acts consistently with that hatred and love.  That is the exact opposite of amoral.

You fail to see any 'reasoning' behind my insults or assertions??!!!!  You are not familiar with irony, are you. :)))))))) There is not a shred of reasoning in your beliefs.  Your beliefs make you blind to facts and reasoning.  'God hates'---hey---listen up here---a non entity cannot hate!  Nor do or feel anything.  You belief in not only a dead idea but a non idea.  Nothing there.  It is good to see that you do know what amoral is. 

[Aletheia]

When you're going to have an argument that features a "god," you will have to substantiate the existence of a "god" first. It is very hard to argue when no facts are involved - as it is the facts that determine which side (if either) is correct in their assumptions.

Facts are rooted in reality and reality can be observed and tested with consistent results.

[stromboli]

God is by definition a supernatural being. Supernatural means not measurable or quantifiable in human terms. So if you postulate a god you can do so only assuming that as such he/she/it is beyond our understanding and therefore not knowable in anything but abstract terms, and even then only as an idea and nothing more.

[josephpalazzo]

I see a perfect God the same way I see Supermanâ,,¢, Batmanâ,,¢ and the Smurfsâ,,¢... a fictional character.

[Baruch]

I see a perfect God the same way I see Supermanâ,,¢, Batmanâ,,¢ and the Smurfsâ,,¢... a fictional character.

Go Popa Smurf ;-)  He would make a better god than the one in the Bible!  Because he would declare smurf-berries are kosher for everyone ;-)

[aitm]

I would postulate that a perfect god could not create imperfect creations and thus, as there is little perfection among any creature, he failed, thus, imperfect, thus impotent. Thus….not a god but perhaps a scientist or an accidental janitor in another dimension completely unaware of his accident.

[stromboli]

I would postulate that a perfect god could not create imperfect creations and thus, as there is little perfection among any creature, he failed, thus, imperfect, thus impotent. Thus….not a god but perhaps a scientist or an accidental janitor in another dimension completely unaware of his accident.

Lol aitm I think you just created the plot for an SF novel: "The Accidental Janitor"

[trdsf]

Well, that would imply perfect justice.  And consigning someone to eternal, unceasing torment for 70 or so years of getting it "wrong" on the basis of information deliberately withheld by the deity in question is simply not just, period.

Positing a 'perfect god' also means taking perfection to be something beyond divinity: that perfection is not inherent in godhood.  Otherwise that qualification is repetitive.

Now, even though it's been used in the ontological argument, that perfection requires existence therefore if god is perfect he must exist, this is simply incorrect.  We use non-existent "perfect" things all the time -- a 'perfect gas' is use all the time in chemistry and physics, even though no perfect gas exists.  It just simplifies things for the sake of calculation.

If anything, "perfect" suggests non-existence.