Hm, several posts seem to be related to the ingenuity of the human mind to create a God. Most of these comments are done in a figurative sense, as though that God were imaginary. But could it be possible in a literal sense? How much power, exactly, could the human mind hold?
I believe it is.
I mean, let's look at the Christian religion. Suppose for a second that it's all completely false (which should be easy for any evolutionists or atheists to do). The power and energy of a small group of people built a belief powerful enough to build an empire, conquer new worlds and continents, and found an organization of buildings that included military, banks, and governments. Jesus is now proclaimed as a God himself by some Christians. Is it possible that human beings not only placed that much power within a divine being, but actually created that divine being in the process.
And is it possible that within the process of our minds molding this divine character that he might have actually come into existence? There are people who claim Jesus or Mary actually visit them. Most of the time they are passed off as crazy or overzealous. But is it possible that they have just contributed so much energy into that thought that it came to fruition?
Stranger things have happened.
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
That still pretty much makes any deity based religion entirely false since the god they worship doesn't exist independently of them. This kind of God is more a group mind than a divine being. Besides, could people really subconciouly agree and come together enough to create an autonomous, coherent being? It seems doubtful to me.
Res ipsa loquitur.
memor mori, mahalo.
In today's society you are probably right,
But back 2-3000 years ago, people were able to come together in groups because of shared problems and a shared need to fix those problems; food, shelter, tyrany, anarchy, predators, plagues... And there were the other things they shared that didn't need immediate answers that they were looking for anyway (what is life, why are they here, the nature of the Earth, etc.)
People back then had to use their minds... today, not so much. We have computers, calculators, grunts, and go-for's to do the dirty work for us and in many cases to think for us.
Now that I've written that out, I'm starting to wonder if the power of the human mind has been shrinking, LOL. "Use it or lose it" syndrome on a mass scale?
-------------
"Dream as though you'll live forever, but live as though there's no tomorrow" --James Dean
http://www.progressiveu.org/user/fanaile-drupal-org
I think that people's minds in general are far too complicated and diverse to concentrate on EXACTLY the same idea long enough, and coherently enough to create an entity through sheer force of will. I mean, half the time we can't even agree what color something is right? Is that car mauve or burgundy?
Some people will be thinking about how god should bless the sheep, others the crops and someone is thinking how the girl next to him would look naked. I don't really think it is necessarily that people don't use their minds today. We may use them for different things. I think that no two minds, much less hundreds or thousands could agree so closely about what a divine being would be like that they could bring a strongly defined being into creation.
I am a big supporter of subjectivity. We can't even be sure if we are seeing the same things or thinking the same things, no matter how much we agree. Think about all the definitions of "good" or "love." Would any kind of sentient "god" result from our collective ideas about these things? Sure maybe everyone in the village is scared of the jaguar, or starving, but some want to protect their families, some want to protect the larders and some want to protect the livestock.
Res ipsa loquitur.
memor mori, mahalo.
I love reading your posts because you make me think. As for me, I know God is real- it's just a feeling I get and I can't deny it- I don't want to deny it. Like today, I saw God in the dancing of the leaves being blown to and fro- who knows? I think if we spent all of our time questioning everything we would go insane. I respect those that do, it shows that they are individuals and not robots, but as for me, if I let my mind wonder too long I will start thinking that we all are just a dream of someone else and someday they will wake up. It's dangerous for me to think LOL!!
Peace n Bike Grease~Sara
Yea, imagination is great, but it gets me into some weird situations at times.
My mother thought she would combat my over-active imagination by explaining the difference between real and imaginary on television. And while it *did* work - I understood the difference, it didn't work the way she thought it would.
For example, we went to see Superman III in theaters - and that movie scared me more than anything ever had up to that point. That stupid scene at the end when the lady got sucked into the computer and turned into a robot? I was like "that *could happen* there are computers and they're building robots!" They couldn't get me near a computer for like 6 months and I couldn't go to sleep until all the computers in the house were unplugged. (My step-father was a designer, so we had about 5 computers - but this was before Windows had come into existence).
Then there was a scene in G.I. Joe where someone hit Lady J in the back of the head and it made her pass out? I didn't know if that was real or imaginary, so I took my gun and hit my sister in the back of the head. It didn't work, and I don't think I ever ran so fast in my life.
-----------------
"Dream as though you'll live forever, but live as though there's no tomorrow" --James Dean
http://www.progressiveu.org/user/fanaile-drupal-org
LOL!! How funny- isn't hiliarious? I mean I've let my imagination take over to the point where I felt like I was crazy!
Peace n Bike Grease~Sara
LOL, me too. I've jumped out of a shower screaming, still covered in soap, because I started imagining a scene in a movie where spiders were coming up from the drain.
Imagine the face on my step-father when he came running into the bathroom to see what was killing me, only to have me say, "I was remembering the spiders and I scared me".
LOL. He was like "did you see a spider?" And I answered, "well, no, not really, only in my head".
-----------------
"Dream as though you'll live forever, but live as though there's no tomorrow" --James Dean
http://www.progressiveu.org/user/fanaile-drupal-org
Let me just share with you- I LOVE crime mystery shows. I live by myself in a cabin in the woods and refuse to take a shower at night because of all the classic murder shower scenes. I'm not sure why I'm perfectly okay with showering in the day time- but not at night?? You know, we just might be crazy??
Peace n Bike Grease~Sara