What Characterizes God?

[TigerNinja]

In many religions, God or their gods are personified having at least some humanoid or magnificent creature's quality. For example, the stereotypical Catholic God is seen as a man with a flowing white beard sitting in his throne among the clouds. In Ancient Egypt, their gods were made from combined traits from multiple creatures, such as Bastet: A humanoid cat, that was a god. In many religions the basic concept applies. Get some humanoid traits combined with either some animal traits or a magnificent defining feature that stands out. Although this is made to give the god, as I said, a defining feature, it is meant to be a great deity. Does this therefore mean that gods necessarily mean that they need to be similar to us though, as many gods have human features?

The end question aimed to be achieved through this is what characterizes God or many gods. They all are formed in different ways depending on your upbringing although what still is a defining characteristic that defines a god as a god and not simply a fictional character?

My opinion on the topic is quite simple. I believe that there is no God or gods. While many Catholics say that "God made us in his image," as a justification for the similarities, I believe the inverse that we made God in our image. We treat him as a human, giving him capabilities of anger, sadness, happiness, and the selfishness of making us worship him or go to Hell. How could such a being feel such silly and often unjustified emotions as us? I see God as simply an emotionless clockwork that flows through everything and gives everything being. He does not live or die, but he is a constant that, as electricity flows through every appliance in a house, flows through everything. Therefore I don't call him (Or in my case 'it'), God. I just call it a constant and describe it, rather than name it. The implications are either that everything is alive or nothing is alive. In my case, I believe that nothing is alive.

Despite this, that is only my belief. What is your opinion on the matter?

[Dark Matter]

My opinion is you should learn something about Catholicism before trying to smear it.

[Ormond]

Well done opening post, thanks.

Since you asked, my thoughts on this matter are that it's more productive to focus on experience than on conclusions.

Conclusions can be fun, and this is a philosophy forum of course, so your points are appropriate here. But not logical. It's not logical to invest too much time in reaching for answers to the very largest questions, given how extremely unlikely it is any of us will ever find useful answers.

Expanding the range of our experience is however very much within our grasp. So the following might be worth investigating.

Forget about believing or disbelieving in religion. Be objective, neutral, open, uncommitted, for obviously you don't know the real answer to the god question, and are very very unlikely to ever know it. So, with all that set aside...

You then have the option to investigate something very interesting. What are the experiences that have propelled religion throughout the ages? How does one explore such experiences?

Again, forget about any notion that the point of such experiences is to travel towards religious belief. FORGET ABOUT RELIGIOUS BELIEF, and anti-religious belief too. Just say no to all of that.

Instead, focus on the experience, value the experience for itself. Not as a means to some other end, but as it's own end.

This is not so complicated.

Why do you want sex?

For the experience.

Like that.

Thinking about sex, having theories and conclusions about sex, can take us only so far, and it's not very far at all. It's the experience we want, the experience we need, not symbols about that experience.

Imagine that you have a photo of a sexual partner. That's what religious and anti-religious beliefs are, symbols, that point to something.

Now imagine that you have the living breathing actual real world sexual partner next to you.

Which is more logical to invest time in? The symbol, or the real thing?

[Eduk]

I see God as simply an emotionless clockwork that flows through everything and gives everything being. He does not live or die, but he is a constant that, as electricity flows through every appliance in a house, flows through everything. Therefore I don't call him (Or in my case 'it'), God. I just call it a constant and describe it, rather than name it.

I think you have characterised god very well already.

[Fooloso4]

The more fundamental question is: who characterizes God? The characteristics of God are dependent on who is doing the characterizing. This is the case whether God exists or not, and even in the event that someone experiences something he or she calls an experience of God. Negative theology does not characterize God, for all characterizations are considered idols.

[Nick_A]

"We can only know one thing about God - that he is what we are not. Our wretchedness alone is an image of this. The more we contemplate it, the more we contemplate him." -SIMONE WEIL

How can you expect to experience what characterizes God without first experiencing what characterizes our wretchedness? Without that experience contemplation will be contaminated by self justifying imagination which characterizes the human condition

[Renee]

My opinion is you should learn something about Catholicism before trying to smear it.

My opinion is you should learn the proper meaning of "smear" before trying to use it in a sentence. (The OP did not smear C. In your mind it did, because you are, in my opinion, a blindly religious person. You can't abide by any mention of god which does not adore it or express a kind of worship or other for it. That is your preference, and I accept that, and now I demand that you accept that your opinion is just that, and you accept that you ought not to go around correcting everyone in a tone of superiorioty who disagrees on an opinion basis with your opinion.)

[Sy Borg]

Forget about believing or disbelieving in religion. Be objective, neutral, open, uncommitted, for obviously you don't know the real answer to the god question, and are very very unlikely to ever know it. So, with all that set aside...

You then have the option to investigate something very interesting. What are the experiences that have propelled religion throughout the ages? How does one explore such experiences?

Again, forget about any notion that the point of such experiences is to travel towards religious belief. FORGET ABOUT RELIGIOUS BELIEF, and anti-religious belief too. Just say no to all of that.

Instead, focus on the experience, value the experience for itself. Not as a means to some other end, but as it's own end.

Coming to conclusions about the ultimate state of reality does seem a tad ambitious, certainly at this time. How much do we understand of the Earth and humanity's place here, let alone anything larger?

[Londoner]

In many religions, God or their gods are personified having at least some humanoid or magnificent creature's quality. For example, the stereotypical Catholic God is seen as a man with a flowing white beard sitting in his throne among the clouds. In Ancient Egypt, their gods were made from combined traits from multiple creatures, such as Bastet: A humanoid cat, that was a god. In many religions the basic concept applies. Get some humanoid traits combined with either some animal traits or a magnificent defining feature that stands out. Although this is made to give the god, as I said, a defining feature, it is meant to be a great deity. Does this therefore mean that gods necessarily mean that they need to be similar to us though, as many gods have human features?

I think that usually there are gods that embody particular features, (features that we recognise in ourselves) but also some sort of all-father god, god to the gods, who is less comprehensible. The unknowable Christian god can be approached through Jesus, Mary and the saints.

My opinion on the topic is quite simple. I believe that there is no God or gods. While many Catholics say that "God made us in his image," as a justification for the similarities, I believe the inverse that we made God in our image. We treat him as a human, giving him capabilities of anger, sadness, happiness, and the selfishness of making us worship him or go to Hell. How could such a being feel such silly and often unjustified emotions as us? I see God as simply an emotionless clockwork that flows through everything and gives everything being. He does not live or die, but he is a constant that, as electricity flows through every appliance in a house, flows through everything. Therefore I don't call him (Or in my case 'it'), God. I just call it a constant and describe it, rather than name it. The implications are either that everything is alive or nothing is alive. In my case, I believe that nothing is alive

Does the description of everything as 'emotionless clockwork' also apply to us? Because I do not feel like that; I feel both part of the world yet also detached from it. It may be that we make God in our image, but the human condition is such that we do not have any clear image of ourselves.

We know we change, become old and die, we can become overcome by lust, or alcohol, or rage. We are subject to the forces of nature. All these things can be embodied in particular gods, yet by doing this we are aware that none of these things represent the totality of our existence.

So I would suggest that religions are quite sophisticated reflections on the human condition. By contrast, when you find yourself concluding with the very peculiar assertion 'I believe that nothing is alive', this is not a disbelief in god but a disbelief in yourself! I'd have thought that idea was harder pill to swallow than is required by any religion!

[Ozymandias]

Great question, thanks.

I agree with your statement of "We made God in our image" in accordance with atheistic thought, but I would rather say 'We interpret God in our image'.

Without preaching, I'll sum up my theological beliefs: God is an entity which we can only observe in vague, opaque, and abstract ways (such as metaphysics, "feeling" like God exists, morality, etc.), and we have created religion to try and explain God. Not consciously, but overall, that has been the goal. I believe most people would agree with me if I say that all religions, and even atheism, seek to understand or define something metaphysical, which is "God", even if god doesn't necessarily exist. (Atheists are not religious, but most of them do believe in morality, which is still metaphysical and non-scientific; thus, morality is god to an atheist). I do think God is conscious, omniscient, etc. but I do not ever picture him as a big ol' bearded man in the clouds.

So I wouldn't argue about who or what God really is, because as a human, my ability to observe him simply cannot give me a clear picture. It's the same for all people throughout history, which is why we have so many humanoid/ human-image depictions of god.

Short summary answer: God is an abstract entity, and since we have a hard time picturing and worshipping an abstract entity, we give it a human face so that we can better understand it.

[Partinobodycular]

Coming to conclusions about the ultimate state of reality does seem a tad ambitious, certainly at this time. How much do we understand of the Earth and humanity's place here, let alone anything larger?

If this is indeed the case, then the most prudent course of action would be to embrace epistemological solipsism.

[Lark_Truth]

God is:
Omnipotent
Omniscient
Omnipresent

If you can't quite seem to figure out who God is, then ask Him yourself, and he will answer. You just have to go looking for that answer.

[Partinobodycular]

If you can't quite seem to figure out who God is, then ask Him yourself, and he will answer. You just have to go looking for that answer.

You don't seem to realize just how ridiculous this argument is. People will find whatever answers they want to find. If they want to find evidence for UFO's, or Bigfoot, or 911 conspiracies, or even for God....they're gonna find it. It doesn't matter whether it's true, or even whether it's rational. It just has to be what they're looking for.

That being said, what most people are looking for is an answer that fits in with their preconceptions. Why, because without preconceptions it's pretty much impossible to construct any rational explanations at all. Every belief has to begin with preconceptions. So the key to finding the truth doesn't lie in examining one's beliefs, but in examining the preconceptions that lead to those beliefs.

Unfortunately for theists, the most insidious preconception of all is that it's immoral to question the preconceptions. But if you really want to find the truth, then abandon the one that you've already found, and begin again. But this time, do it without preconceptions. Any God that can't hold up to such impartial questioning, isn't worth believing in.

[Eduk]

God is an entity which we can only observe in vague, opaque, and abstract ways (such as metaphysics, "feeling" like God exists, morality, etc.), and we have created religion to try and explain God. Not consciously, but overall, that has been the goal. I believe most people would agree with me if I say that all religions, and even atheism, seek to understand or define something metaphysical, which is "God", even if god doesn't necessarily exist. (Atheists are not religious, but most of them do believe in morality, which is still metaphysical and non-scientific; thus, morality is god to an atheist).

Sorry morality and theism have nothing to do with each other. Morality is not non-scientific, there have been many many studies into morality. It is a very tricky subject to scientifically test though as most experiments you could think up to test morality would be immoral. In fact such studies are illegal due to their very immorality.

[Steve3007]

Lark_Truth:

If you can't quite seem to figure out who God is, then ask Him yourself, and he will answer. You just have to go looking for that answer.

Partinobodycular's answer:

You don't seem to realize just how ridiculous this argument is. People will find whatever answers they want to find. If they want to find evidence for UFO's, or Bigfoot, or 911 conspiracies, or even for God....they're gonna find it. It doesn't matter whether it's true, or even whether it's rational. It just has to be what they're looking for.

That being said, what most people are looking for is an answer that fits in with their preconceptions. Why, because without preconceptions it's pretty much impossible to construct any rational explanations at all. Every belief has to begin with preconceptions. So the key to finding the truth doesn't lie in examining one's beliefs, but in examining the preconceptions that lead to those beliefs.

Unfortunately for theists, the most insidious preconception of all is that it's immoral to question the preconceptions. But if you really want to find the truth, then abandon the one that you've already found, and begin again. But this time, do it without preconceptions. Any God that can't hold up to such impartial questioning, isn't worth believing in.

Good answer. You're talking about the perils of extreme confirmation bias and the methods we can use to try to stop it. As you've said, most people don't want to combat their confirmation bias. Having our beliefs confirmed, and re-affirmed by others, is comforting. But for those who do, another method, as well as examining underlying preconceptions, is to actively seek falsification, rather than confirmation, of one's existing beliefs; seek out people who disagree with us (and can state coherent reasons why) and ignore people who agree with us.