Now one of the issues that has been bugging me in this class for a while is the existence of God. The attitude I've taken thus far is that I'd like to see just how much about this world can be understood without relying on the concept of God. The moment God is brought into an argument, there can be no more room for rationality.
To put it another way, we have been discussing various topics in the philosophical community. And it's interesting that we have not been able to discuss one topic without coming across the notion of God. Also interesting to note is that God comes into the picture whenever we seemingly have no rational answer. And this has happened every step of the way: "How do we know there's a reality? God." "How do we know there's a self? God." "How do we have free will? God.", etc. Whenever we come to a conflicting rational arguments, God can be used to resolve the conflict.
Now I'm not saying God doesn't necessarily exist. Rather, I am advocating that even those who do believe in God try to understand as much about life as they can through philosophical inquiry (which may have to suspend belief in God). Of course, spirituality has its place, too. I think only once one is unable to come to a rational understanding of the world should a person turn to religion for answers. According to Hebrews 11:1 (KJV) "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." In those terms, we should try to explain what can be "seen"/observed, and what cannot be explained may be accepted by merits of faith.
2 comments:
You've my sentiments, sir.
I've been going through a sort of mental revolution the past year or so and a lot of it has been centered around God. Whenever I speak to my friends about some of the philosophical issues that we've discussed in class, it's always interesting, because some actually rethink things, or they simply land on God and that's where they stop questioning. As if they're scared to even try to answer the question, or scared to even question the things that God does, for fear of being sacrilegious. There's a certain belief that Satan likes to plant seeds of doubt, and some people seem to think that doubt is an absolute thing, something that cannot be done. Rationalizing something that you can basically put on God shouldn't be done to them, but I think it should be done. I think it's important.
That's essentially why I can't wait to discuss God. Not that it'll give me any particular closure, I'm sure it'll pose more questions than answer them, but I think it'll hopefully open my mind a bit and inspire a certain amount of clarity.
Great blog. People use god as an explanation for everything because honestly god IS the explanation for everything in their realities...everything they believe in and rely upon. Naturally, questioning the influence of god in all of these things you discussed...free will, reality, et cetera, would make people feel insecure and threatened. When someone is questioned about the foundation upon which their entire lives are built, it can cause a fear that would keep a person from questioning. The danger with questioning is that you might not like the answer. If these people who rely on god for every explanation were to question reality, and find out that it has nothing to do with god, they would have to re structure in their minds everything they knew to be true.
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