Proof for a personal God

[Angela77]

What is a good way to explain why God must logically be personal? Aquinas’ contingency theory for the existence of a Creator is excellent. How do I explain that the Creator cares about people?

 

[bzkoss236]

I don’t know about a good explanation, but here’s one.

Assuming that you break the barrier to an intelligent Creator, or at least the possibility of such, with someone, then I would say that such a Creator would want to personally interact with said creation. Why?

My reasoning has to do with Man’s purpose. I would venture to say that if such a Creator is infinitely intelligent, then it (He) would not create something without a purpose, because what is the sense in creating something for no reason? So, if it (He) created the universe for a purpose, and more specifically, created Human Beings for a specific purpose, it (He) would want to communicate to us what our purpose is. And, to go a bit further, if we do indeed have free will, and can reject this Creator, then it (He) would then want to appeal to us personally for us to gain its (His) trust.

Note: I put the revealed pronoun in parenthesis because someone who is not Christian may refer to God simply as an it.

also, this is far from perfect, but it follows some of my reasoning for why God is personal

 

[Sair]

I don’t know about a good explanation, but here’s one.

Assuming that you break the barrier to an intelligent Creator, or at least the possibility of such, with someone, then I would say that such a Creator would want to personally interact with said creation. Why?

My reasoning has to do with Man’s purpose. I would venture to say that if such a Creator is infinitely intelligent, then it (He) would not create something without a purpose, because what is the sense in creating something for no reason? So, if it (He) created the universe for a purpose, and more specifically, created Human Beings for a specific purpose, it (He) would want to communicate to us what our purpose is. And, to go a bit further, if we do indeed have free will, and can reject this Creator, then it (He) would then want to appeal to us personally for us to gain its (His) trust.

Note: I put the revealed pronoun in parenthesis because someone who is not Christian may refer to God simply as an it.

also, this is far from perfect, but it follows some of my reasoning for why God is personal

Humans create for purposes without necessarily having a personal interest in what becomes of our creations. Consider the selective breeding of other animals - certainly it’s possible for humans to become attached to livestock, but at the end of the day, their purpose has nothing whatsoever to do with that attachment; and what’s more, in these days of industrial-scale ‘farming’ of food-producing animals, there can be no scope for personal, let alone individual concern for any animal’s wellbeing. They still have a purpose, in relation to us at least.

I would have thought that any being elevated so far above us in power and presence and perspective and so on would care for us little, if any, more than we would care for individual ants. So it might be possible to make the case for a personal god without adding the proviso that such a being should have any concern to spare for any particular individual. If God is already, in fact (if not in theology) limited in his powers to prevent evil and suffering in the world, or to build a perfect creation, or to have refrained from creating beings that he already knew would commit evil; or in his knowledge that they would commit evil; then perhaps he is emotionally limited in his ability to care for the fate of all his creations. Epicurus had such a view of the gods, as did the Ancient Greeks in general - their gods were most certainly personal, though not necessarily caring or considerate towards humans (sometimes quite the opposite).

Furthermore, if we have an ultimate, cosmic purpose and it’s actually important for us to fulfill it, why would God be so silent, so ambiguous, as to revealing what that purpose might be? Does anyone have a clear explanation that doesn’t come down to fanciful notions of our spending eternity worshipping this god in a paradise that no-one has ever been able to elucidate?

 

[tonyrey]

Humans create for purposes without necessarily having a personal interest in what becomes of our creations. Consider the selective breeding of other animals - certainly it’s possible for humans to become attached to livestock, but at the end of the day, their purpose has nothing whatsoever to do with that attachment; and what’s more, in these days of industrial-scale ‘farming’ of food-producing animals, there can be no scope for personal, let alone individual concern for any animal’s wellbeing. They still have a purpose, in relation to us at least.

I would have thought that any being elevated so far above us in power and presence and perspective and so on would care for us little, if any, more than we would care for individual ants.

That presumptuous assertion tells us far more about your personality than the nature of reality! To model the Creator on your personal attitude to ants is ludicrous.

So it might be possible to make the case for a personal god without adding the proviso that such a being should have any concern to spare for any particular individual.

That presumptuous assertion tells us far more about your personality than the nature of reality!

If God is already, in fact (if not in theology) limited in his powers to prevent evil and suffering in the world, or to build a perfect creation, or to have refrained from creating beings that he already knew would commit evil; or in his knowledge that they would commit evil; then perhaps he is emotionally limited in his ability to care for the fate of all his creations.

A false conclusion based on a false premise.

Epicurus had such a view of the gods, as did the Ancient Greeks in general - their gods were most certainly personal, though not necessarily caring or considerate towards humans (sometimes quite the opposite).

They clearly overlooked the immense value of life. Do you?

Furthermore, if we have an ultimate, cosmic purpose and it’s actually important for us to fulfill it, why would God be so silent, so ambiguous, as to revealing what that purpose might be?

1. You assume all religions and revelations are completely worthless. On what basis?
2. You overlook the need for freedom to choose what to believe and how to live.

Does anyone have a clear explanation that doesn’t come down to fanciful notions of our spending eternity worshipping this god in a paradise that no-one has ever been able to elucidate?

Your distortion of belief in paradise is based on a scheme of things that has never been elucidated nor verified nor rendered consistent with your power to choose what to believe and how to live.

 

[Sair]

That presumptuous assertion tells us far more about your personality than the nature of reality! To model the Creator on your personal attitude to ants is ludicrous.

That presumptuous assertion tells us far more about your personality than the nature of reality!

For someone so apparently oversensitive to ‘ad hominem’ attacks, you seem remarkably willing to level what you would interpret as such. Do you care for individual ants? Would you declare with absolute honesty that you think your god is closer to us that we are to ants? Frankly, I wince if I see an individual ant being eaten, or suffering some other horrible fate, like being burned to a crisp by a child with a magnifying glass. Do you?

A false conclusion based on a false premise.

And what false premise would that be, exactly? The way God invariably comes through at our times of greatest peril and prevents things like war and violent death and ravaging diseases? What dream world are you living in?

They clearly overlooked the immense value of life. Do you?

Perhaps life is only immensely valuable to those who possess it. Sometimes not even to them. And whether or not life in general, or my life in particular, has value to me has absolutely no bearing whatsoever upon whether it is valuable to beings with the characteristics ascribed to gods.

1. You assume all religions and revelations are completely worthless. On what basis?

I don’t assume this - firstly, I don’t assume it of my own religion, pantheism. I question the value of religions that subjugate the needs and desires of real beings to those of other beings that are, for all they can demonstrate, imaginary; and whence your ‘revelations’? What makes the claimed revelatory contents of the Bible, for example, more valuable or more true than those of the Book of Mormon, for example, or those of the Koran? How can you distinguish one set of revelations from another, except by a deliberate commitment of faith - perhaps one with which you were imbued in childhood?

1. You overlook the need for freedom to choose what to believe and how to live.

People have the right to believe what they believe, until it interferes with the rights and wellbeing of others. I think it’s a mistake to suppose that people ‘choose’ what to believe - either there is compelling evidence or there is social compulsion or, worse, coercion.

Your distortion of belief in paradise is based on a scheme of things that has never been elucidated nor verified nor rendered consistent with your power to choose what to believe and how to live.

Then what is the purpose of humanity, if you are indeed claiming to be privy to such knowledge?

 

[tonyrey]

That presumptuous assertion tells us far more about your personality than the nature of reality! To model the Creator on your personal attitude to ants is ludicrous.

That presumptuous assertion tells us far more about your personality than the nature of reality!Do you care for individual ants? Would you declare with absolute honesty that you think your god is closer to us that we are to ants? Frankly, I wince if I see an individual ant being eaten, or suffering some other horrible fate, like being burned to a crisp by a child with a magnifying glass. Do you?

Your remarks are inconsistent with your statement:

I would have thought that any being elevated so far above us in power and presence and perspective and so on** would care for us little, if any, more than we would care for individual ants.**

Your presumption was also anticipated by a far greater moral authority than either you or I:

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father.

And what false premise would that be, exactly? The way God invariably comes through at our times of greatest peril and prevents things like war and violent death and ravaging diseases? What dream world are you living in?

Yet another false deduction from another false premise: the dream world that an accident-free, disease-free, violence-free world is **feasible. **You should read *Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion *by David Hume who was a sceptic but he had enough perspicacity to reject that infantile fantasy.

They clearly overlooked the immense value of life. Do you?

Perhaps life is only immensely valuable to those who possess it. Sometimes not even to them. And whether or not life in general, or my life in particular, has value to me has absolutely no bearing whatsoever upon whether it is valuable to beings with the characteristics ascribed to gods.It is not a question of your opinion but the fact that life gives everyone the opportunity - as pointed out by an atheist Thomas Nagel - to decide for themselves whether it is worth living.

1. You assume all religions and revelations are completely worthless. On what basis?

I don’t assume this - firstly, I don’t assume it of my own religion, pantheism.Pantheism is not a religion but a philosophy - unless you worship nature.

I question the value of religions that subjugate the needs and desires of real beings to those of other beings that are, for all they can demonstrate, imaginary; and whence your ‘revelations’?

“subjugate” is a loaded term that can be applied with equal facility to those who put their own opinions, needs and desires before everything else and regard them as private revelations - as if they have privileged insight into the nature of reality.

What makes the claimed revelatory contents of the Bible, for example, more valuable or more true than those of the Book of Mormon, for example, or those of the Koran? How can you distinguish one set of revelations from another, except by a deliberate commitment of faith - perhaps one with which you were imbued in childhood?

What makes you claim your opinions are true except by a deliberate commitment of faith which stems from your natural urges?

1. You overlook the need for freedom to choose what to believe and how to live.

People have the right to believe what they believe, until it interferes with the rights and wellbeing of others. I think it’s a mistake to suppose that people ‘choose’ what to believe - either there is compelling evidence or there is social compulsion or, worse, coercion. On what rational ground you base human rights?

Your distortion of belief in paradise is based on a scheme of things that has never been elucidated nor verified nor rendered consistent with your power to choose what to believe and how to live.

Then what is the purpose of humanity, if you are indeed claiming to be privy to such knowledge? Another false assertion! I base my belief that the purpose of life is to choose what to believe and how to live on the indisputable fact that every reasonable person does precisely that - rather than stake everything on Chance.

 

[empther]

Something that creates or otherwise produces something else must have what that something else has in some manner.

An acorn can cause an oak tree, but not a lion which has much that the acorn doesn’t.

Could God create a human beings with intelligence, will, and goals without having these things himself in some way? I say he can’t.

This is not a formal proof, just a first draft idea. But you can see where it’s going.

 

[bzkoss236]

Humans create for purposes without necessarily having a personal interest in what becomes of our creations. Consider the selective breeding of other animals - certainly it’s possible for humans to become attached to livestock, but at the end of the day, their purpose has nothing whatsoever to do with that attachment; and what’s more, in these days of industrial-scale ‘farming’ of food-producing animals, there can be no scope for personal, let alone individual concern for any animal’s wellbeing. They still have a purpose, in relation to us at least.

I would have thought that any being elevated so far above us in power and presence and perspective and so on would care for us little, if any, more than we would care for individual ants. So it might be possible to make the case for a personal god without adding the proviso that such a being should have any concern to spare for any particular individual. If God is already, in fact (if not in theology) limited in his powers to prevent evil and suffering in the world, or to build a perfect creation, or to have refrained from creating beings that he already knew would commit evil; or in his knowledge that they would commit evil; then perhaps he is emotionally limited in his ability to care for the fate of all his creations. Epicurus had such a view of the gods, as did the Ancient Greeks in general - their gods were most certainly personal, though not necessarily caring or considerate towards humans (sometimes quite the opposite).

Furthermore, if we have an ultimate, cosmic purpose and it’s actually important for us to fulfill it, why would God be so silent, so ambiguous, as to revealing what that purpose might be? Does anyone have a clear explanation that doesn’t come down to fanciful notions of our spending eternity worshipping this god in a paradise that no-one has ever been able to elucidate?

I said a being that is infinitely intelligent. We humans are down-right as stupid as a rock in comparison. Intelligent people don’t create things without a purpose, even if the purpose is purely aesthetic or to gain more knowledge, but if you already know everything, then something will only be created for a purpose. People who cross-breed animals do so for the purpose of curiosity and learning. If they did so without purpose, they would have discarded the animals and/or plants when done without need for it. Instead, they study it, see what happens, what changed from the originals, there is purpose in that.

Also God hasn’t been silent, we’ve been ignoring him. Revelations from Him have occurred throughout history, we just have to be willing to listen.

 

[Angela77]

Thanks for (some of) the answers!

But I didn’t really want this to turn into a debate thread…

 

[bzkoss236]

Thanks for (some of) the answers!

But I didn’t really want this to turn into a debate thread…

Kind of hard to do when having a discussion about such a topic. It may not have turned into a debate if there were no one to take the opposite viewpoint, but as it is (and should be), there are people on these forums who do not believe in God or any gods, and they will take the opposing viewpoint. It’s inevitable. You could ask nicely for only Christians to post, but some people might not notice that or choose to ignore it to get their opinion in.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

What is a good way to explain why God must logically be personal? Aquinas’ contingency theory for the existence of a Creator is excellent. How do I explain that the Creator cares about people?

Keep reading in Part 1 of the S.T., I it comes up in Ques 27-32 on the Trinity, Ques 33-43 on Each of the Divine Persons, Ques 75-83 on man, Ques 90-102 man the image of God, Ques 84-89 human intelligence, Ques 103-109 Divine Gov. Typically Thomas does not treat subjects nice and neat in one spot like a text book. He treats each subject and its various aspects as they crop up throughout his works. Can be quite maddening at times.

But if you read all that you should get a good answer.
\

 

[Sair]

Something that creates or otherwise produces something else must have what that something else has in some manner.

An acorn can cause an oak tree, but not a lion which has much that the acorn doesn’t.

Could God create a human beings with intelligence, will, and goals without having these things himself in some way? I say he can’t.

This is not a formal proof, just a first draft idea. But you can see where it’s going.

It seems to be an expanded version of the idea that intelligence has to come from intelligence; essentially, that intelligence/mind/consciousness are some special, irreducible substance that can’t develop from simpler components - much like the inability of creationists to fathom how the complexity and diversity of life could arise from simpler components.

There’s really no reason intelligence could not emerge from particular arrangements of simpler components. Just look at the development of a human child, for example - intelligence is something that develops and emerges gradually; the infant does not already contain all the intelligence it will have as an adult - the neural connections have yet to be formed.

 

[bzkoss236]

It seems to be an expanded version of the idea that intelligence has to come from intelligence; essentially, that intelligence/mind/consciousness are some special, irreducible substance that can’t develop from simpler components - much like the inability of creationists to fathom how the complexity and diversity of life could arise from simpler components.

There’s really no reason intelligence could not emerge from particular arrangements of simpler components. Just look at the development of a human child, for example - intelligence is something that develops and emerges gradually; the infant does not already contain all the intelligence it will have as an adult - the neural connections have yet to be formed.

But a child’s intelligence is grown out of the intelligence of their parents, teachers, and other peers. It didn’t just come to spontaneously be. The intelligence had to come from somewhere else first. So its intelligence was begotten by other intelligence.

 

[tonyrey]

But a child’s intelligence is grown out of the intelligence of their parents, teachers, and other peers. It didn’t just come to spontaneously be. The intelligence had to come from somewhere else first. So its intelligence was begotten by other intelligence.

Irrefutable!

 

[empther]

From Sair’s post 12:

There’s really no reason intelligence could not emerge from particular arrangements of simpler components. Just look at the development of a human child, for example - intelligence is something that develops and emerges gradually; the infant does not already contain all the intelligence it will have as an adult - the neural connections have yet to be formed.

Either intelligence is a power of spirit, or it is nothing but an organization of atoms.
If it’s an organization of atoms then we shouldn’t even bother discussing it since we’re nothing but animals and what happens to us doesn’t matter one iota.

If intelligence is spirit then there are no “simpler components”. There is only the one thing: the spirit. And since the spirit could not have come from evolutionary processes like the body, any power it has must be totally dependent on God every moment. So Aquinas says that God moves our thoughts, although not in a deterministic way. We choose our thoughts. So God has to have at least our level of intelligence along with all the other personal charactersstics.

( Of course, these ideas are above the understanding of the atheist crowd. Which is why the “debate” goes on without end. )

 

[inocente]

But a child’s intelligence is grown out of the intelligence of their parents, teachers, and other peers. It didn’t just come to spontaneously be. The intelligence had to come from somewhere else first. So its intelligence was begotten by other intelligence.

If we apply your logic to the universe, it would mean the universe couldn’t come from nothing but had to be begotten by another universe.

Einstein’s parents were not as intelligent as him, and in the same way his grandparents could have been still less intelligent and so on back through the generations to dumber than dumberer.

 

[Peter_Plato]

If we apply your logic to the universe, it would mean the universe couldn’t come from nothing but had to be begotten by another universe.

Einstein’s parents were not as intelligent as him, and in the same way his grandparents could have been still less intelligent and so on back through the generations to dumber than dumberer.

Not necessarily. His logic only commits him to the admission that something with sufficient resources to create the universe did so, not that another universe had to be involved. When a human being builds a house or car, there is no need to infer that the designer/builder had to be a house or car themselves, but only that they had sufficient alternative resources to do so.

In the case of the universe, since matter, time, space and energy all began to exist at the Big Bang instant, then whatever is proposed as an explanation for the Big Bang event could not have been material, temporal or spacial since these did not exist prior to the event. In fact there was no "prior” since space/time began at BB. However, since matter, space, time and energy are eliminated as prior conditions, then whatever is proposed as a sufficient explanation must have had the resources (omnipotence?) to bring those into being first.

 

[inocente]

Not necessarily. His logic only commits him to the admission that something with sufficient resources to create the universe did so, not that another universe had to be involved. When a human being builds a house or car, there is no need to infer that the designer/builder had to be a house or car themselves, but only that they had sufficient alternative resources to do so.

But the argument was “intelligence was begotten by other intelligence”, not that intelligence could be produced by sufficient alternative resources.

But let’s go with your argument. Are you saying that the resources of the entire universe were insufficient to produce the intelligence of an ant, or just not quite enough to produce human intelligence?

In the case of the universe, since matter, time, space and energy all began to exist at the Big Bang instant, then whatever is proposed as an explanation for the Big Bang event could not have been material, temporal or spacial since these did not exist prior to the event. In fact there was no "prior” since space/time began at BB. However, since matter, space, time and energy are eliminated as prior conditions, then whatever is proposed as a sufficient explanation must have had the resources (omnipotence?) to bring those into being first.

Slow down there partner. The big bang theory doesn’t say the universe came from nothing, even though that’s what many are taught. The guy who originated the theory, Father George Lemaître, said:

We may speak of this event as of a beginning. I do not say a creation. Physically it is a beginning in the sense that if something happened before, it has no observable influence on the behavior of our universe, as any feature of matter before this beginning has been completely lost by the extreme contraction at the theoretical zero. Any preexistence of the universe has a metaphysical character. Physically, everything happens as if the theoretical zero was really a beginning. The question if it was really a beginning or rather a creation, something started from nothing, is a philosophical question which cannot be settled by physical or astronomical considerations. - catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=8847

(I’ve quoted that so often I’ve got it on speed-dial ).

Also, there’s good reason to believe that the aggregate energy of the entire universe is exactly zero, which puts a different complexion on what omnipotent might mean.

 

[HelenRose]

For what it is worth my thought is this.

It takes intelligence to comprehend the universe, it must have taken intelligence to create it.

 

[inocente]

For what it is worth my thought is this.

It takes intelligence to comprehend the universe, it must have taken intelligence to create it.

It takes eyes to see the universe, so it must have taken eyes to create it?