To All Of God's Critics

[Thumbelina]

Here's a challenge to all of God's critics. If you were God and you had to create beings:

 

1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?

3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

[Brakeman]

Here's a challenge to all of God's critics. If you were God and you had to create beings:

 

1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?

3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

 

1. More powerful, so they can take care of me.

2. If they were more powerful, then they would have their own will.

3. I couldn't

4. Nothing, I would be helpless.

[Realist]

Here's a challenge to all of God's critics. If you were God and you had to create beings:

 

1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?

3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

 

 

.... totally pointless questions in my opinion! Go read your "babble" and you will find man's attempts already to answer these questions that you post. A book written by man for man ... absolutely nothing to do with some divine authorship!

[florduh]

I, for one, am not a critic of any gods. There are none to criticize.

 

That said, as purely a flight of science fiction fantasy, each person would likely imbue their deified self with anthropomorphic qualities that reflect their individual values and societal norms. I think that explains why barbaric Bronze Age desert tribes imagined a cruel, warlike, misogynistic and vengeful god, and later, more civilized societies modified and "cleaned up" that god to more closely match the mores of their times.

 

Personally, I would be a deity who creates less powerful beings (otherwise I wouldn't remain their god for long) and give them absolute free will. I would let all my creatures live in an Eden-like world, for I created them and am responsible for their success and happiness. Since they are not flawed creations (I only do perfect things) they don't need rules.

[bdp]

*yawn*

[Guest Valkyrie0010]

I think I could summerize all four into one answer.

 

A Logical diety, that makes bit of sense.

[nightflight]

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

 

I would give them eternal existence filled with unspeakable pain. Their suffering would never end, never. As every nerve of their bodies feel the pain of the flames, their despair would still increase exponentially when they realize that their torment will never end, ages rolling upon ages.

 

What would you do, Thumbelina?

[Mriana]

Humans create gods, so I am not sure what the point of your question is. How can I be "God" if it is humans who create the gods? Although I am "a goddess" in that I created and gave birth two beautiful sons, but they are flesh and blood, just as I am. Like me, their blood is red, their heart pumps the blood, and they breathe oxygen. So, I'd say I did damn well in creating others just like myself, but mentally they are their own persons.

 

Oh and if they break my rules, I do what most sane parents do- take away privileges, ground them, and alike. Of course, they are grown now and have to face any consequences society dishes out to them, if they break the rules.

[Legion]

1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?

I would create Rastafarians. Their power exists on a different plane and cannot be compared to mine.

 

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?

Their free-will would be bound by the limits of musical expression.

 

3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?

I would also create weed.

 

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

Jah rules?

[par4dcourse]

I, for one, am not a critic of any gods. There are none to criticize.

 

 

Likewise.

[oddbird1963]

Here's a challenge to all of God's critics.

 

What exactly do you mean by "God's critics?" There is not God. That's sorta the point of ex-Christian dot net. We are no longer Christians because we don't believe in the existence of the god of the Bible.

 

So, there's not a god to criticize.

 

Are you trying to get us to "walk a mile in " god's "moccasins?" Are his feelings hurt or something?

 

If you were God and you had to create beings:

 

1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?

That will be up to my sovereign will. Have faith and you will know, maybe after you die. Maybe you will know before then. He He He usually people just make crap up about me to appease and soothe themselves. Really, they don't know squat!

 

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?

Enough free will to make them autonomous organic,conscious and intelligent, upright walking primates.

 

3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?

If I am god, then they cannot hurt me. I would make sure they wouldn't choose to hurt one another.

 

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

 

They won't break the rules. If they do I will educate them. My creation is pretty malleable and responsive to correction. It'll be cool. I stay on top of things.

[centauri]

Here's a challenge to all of God's critics. If you were God and you had to create beings:

 

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

I would call them Christians and make them sing praises to me for eternity.

[Dagan]

It's too bad she won't live.

 

But then again, who does?

[Franko47]

There's no real challenge here. Criticizing "god" is irrelevant. "God" can do what he wants. Whatever he does is perfect, because he's God.

 

If you believe your Bible, then you have to agree with this.

 

This is where we get the idea of God. A perfect being, a perfect creator, beyond criticism or question.

 

 

If you believe your Bible, then you have to agree with this.

 

 

No explanations or arguments are even necessary. The Bible is perfect, and God has done and made everything perfectly. Everything is moving along some kind of perfect "plan", and it's not up to human worshipers to criticize, understand, or even comment.

 

If you believe your Bible, then you have to agree with this.

[The-Captain]

1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?

I would create Rastafarians. Their power exists on a different plane and cannot be compared to mine.

 

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?

Their free-will would be bound by the limits of musical expression.

 

3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?

I would also create weed.

 

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

Jah rules?

 

Clicking on this thread was not a complete waste of my time!

[godlessgrrl]

Here's a challenge to all of God's critics. If you were God and you had to create beings:

Okay, just to be nitpicky, I don't think there's any god to criticize for real, either. But Christians have a concept of god, and there's much to criticize in that concept.

 

That said, if I were suddenly granted godhood, and felt like creating some little creatures:

 

1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?

1. I'm not sure. Probably less powerful.

 

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?

2. Do I have omniscience as part of my godhood? If so, then there is no such thing as free will, and I could only impart an illusion of it to my creation.

 

If I do not have omniscience, then why call me god?

 

3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?

3. If I'm god, they can't hurt me. To prevent them harming each other, I'd make them happy, stupid, and complacent.

 

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

4. I'd cut them off from the midnight buffet.

[OnceConvinced]

I don't criticise God, just as I do not critisize Darth Vader, Voldemort or Harry Potter. I'm more likely to criticise the writers/directors of the books/movies, just as I would criticise the human writers of the bible and the stories they wrote of their God. But I guess if Trekkies can have fun talking about who is the best Captain of the Enterprise, I can surely make believe that God is real and be critical of him so that I can answer your questions.

 

1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?

Less powerful. But I wouldn't treat them like scum like the God of the bible does. I'd value my creations and not just wipe out entire nations because they do stuff I don't like. If I made a mistake with one, I'd just make an adjustment of some kind and get rid of the flaw, after all that's what a good creator would do.

 

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?

I'd give them freewill, but I would put mechanisms in place to prevent them from doing evil. After all, there are already mechanisms in place like pain and fear to protect humans from physical danger and we don't accuse God of violating our freewill with those, so why not have mechanisms in place to prevent spiritual damage, which I'm sure you'd agree is more important than our physical wellbeing.

 

 

3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?

I'd put in mechanisms to prevent this, ie pain, fear. I would have them become physically sick (like on the movie Clockwork Orange) to prevent them. Doing evil would be a disgusting and appalling thing to them all, just as many things already are to 99.9% of humans, eg cannibalism, beastiality, eating faeces, sadomasachism. Seeing as things like fear and pain are not violations of freewill (because all humans have these mechanisms in them to prevent from physically harming themselves), then why not have such mechanisms in place to protect us from doing evil to others? In some ways these mechanisms are already there. I for instance could never deliberately harm another person because it would cause me too much guilt. In fact I can imagine the guilt I'd feel even before doing it. It would be horrible for me. So I'd make all humans have that same trait, but perhaps, make it more intense.

 

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

With my system in place nobody would be breaking the rules, because even the thought of doing evil would made them physically sick. But ok, there may be a few messed up indivuals (although I'd make sure there would be no such things as mental illnesses) who may decide they love the pain, love the fear and love feeling physically sick). For them I would have some rehabilitation system in place. Being God I would easily be able to make an adjustment or two to prevent them from offending again. I'm sure that nobody would mind losing some freewill to avoid Hell. I know I'd gladly be God's puppet to avoid Hell.

 

...........

But if none of this is good enough for you, how about you ask God how he's going to solve these problems in Heaven? Then ask him why he didn't just employ those methods to begin with?

[cullyloden]

I assume that the god entity to whom you refer in name is the judeo-christian character written of in the ancient eclectic compendium which in English is now called The Bible. Based on what is written of this character, it possesses an infinite lifespan and is therefore infinitely old. If a being were infinitely old, then logically it would have experienced all possible events, since an infinite time span will yield an infinite variety of possibilities, events and outcomes. After having experienced even a measly 100 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 years of life, an infinitely tiny figure when compared to infinity milliseconds, the mind of this being would logically be somewhat advanced and even alien when compared to Man's mind, even the greatest mind available to mankind. We are a species whose lifespan averages less than eighty years. Therefore I contend that no-one, not anyone or everyone alive could even begin to imagine the structure, mechanisms, biases, likes, dislikes or motives developed in a mind which has already experienced all possible events an infinite number of times. So what is the point of your questions? Is it to try and learn by consensus what the thought processes and motives of such a being might be? A similarly valid question would be If you were Enlil, would you allow Enkidu and Gilgamesh to kill Humbaba when Humbaba is your appointed guardian of the cedar forest? Another line of equally valid questions would be:

 

If you were Jon Arbuckle and you had to create cartoon characters:

1.Will the cartoon characters you create be equal to you or less powerful?

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those cartoon characters?

3.How will you prevent those cartoon characters from hurting you, each other and their backdrop?

4.What will you do with those cartoon characters who break your rules?

-Cully

[Vigile]

Here's a challenge to all of God's critics. If you were God and you had to create beings:

 

1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?

3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

 

If I were god creating my minions, I'd probably leave out the appendix and other vestigial parts like toes. I'd like to work on the current design model too and tighten up some loose ends (pun intended). For instance, cat's don't have to wipe after they shit but humans leave a big ol' mess down there. Surely putting cat butts on humans would be a big improvement, no? Or heck, why even create animals that have to eat and deposit waste in the first place? I'd probably just rig everything with solar power so that they can live on saline solution. Far less messy and time consuming.

 

And ears. Why can't I open and close them like eyes? Being able to close my ears would be a great boon when one is around a proselytizer and when walking by construction sites. Oh, and ugly moles, plaque-causing bacteria, degenerative aging disorders; the whole lot of them, they'd be gone.

 

Then I'd choose to not be a dick and avoid creating parasites, especially disease-carrying ones like mosquitoes. And while we're on that topic, I'd probably choose to not create disease too. And then, assuming I'm a loving guy, I'd probably not create a world that is based on survival of the fittest; a world where baby lions are ripped from their mother's tit to be brutally murdered by their father's conqueror and where humans and animals who don't fall at the top of their food chain aren't merely forced to eke out a living in a world of subsistence.

 

But then I'm a tad bit more moral than the xian god.

[StevoMuso]

And I certainly wouldn't ask my creation to kill innocent animals/babies/each other in order to ask me to forgive them for being inferior to me.

 

Look at my own household (which, in a sense, I have created). If I was like the Christian God I would want my son to kill Nigel (his cute innocent little hamster) and pour the spilled blood onto an altar if he did something wrong so maybe I could forgive him. Naah - I wouldn't - I'd just simply forgive him.

 

Oh yeah - atheists would make much better gods (but then would a god who is an atheist believe in himself?)

[dagnarus]

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

 

This reminds me of my time back in church, often people would say stuff like how if people like us were God we'd be so much harsher than bible god, Always in the back of my mind was the thought, really? you'd really send people to an eternity of fiery torture? Anyway, I'm guessing your pushing for the idea that all people would be, authoritarian enough that they would actually require the eternal torment of those who didn't deign to follow their rules, it ain't true, furthermore, I would suggest that if you, personally, would actually sentence those who didn't follow your rules, to eternal torment, that means your evil, pure and simple.

[Ouroboros]

Here's a challenge to all of God's critics. If you were God and you had to create beings:

 

1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?

Definitely less.

 

2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?

Depends on what purpose I'd have for creating them.

 

3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?

a) hurting me

I'd create them in such way that they couldn't

 

each other

Depends on the purpose for me creating them

 

c) creation

I'm not sure what hurting the creation would mean in that context

 

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

If I created them so they were able to break my rules, then I didn't create them right.

If I make up rules for them to follow, it would mean I had made them so they would follow them.

If I had made them able to break any arbitrary rule I had made, it would mean that it was my intention from start to make them able to break any arbitrary rule I had made.

The blame wouldn't be on them.

 

If I create a car and it is not according to my standards, I would just melt it down and start over. Never would I invent some kind of punishment for the car, a punishment just for it being a car.

[Thumbelina]

Here's a challenge to all of God's critics. If you were God and you had to create beings:1.Will the beings you create be equal to you or less powerful?2.What degree of free will will you allow to those beings?3.How will you prevent those beings from hurting you, each other and their creation?4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

1. More powerful, so they can take care of me.2. If they were more powerful, then they would have their own will.3. I couldn't 4. Nothing, I would be helpless.

 

 

I, for one, am not a critic of any gods. There are none to criticize.That said, as purely a flight of science fiction fantasy, each person would likely imbue their deified self with anthropomorphic qualities that reflect their individual values and societal norms. I think that explains why barbaric Bronze Age desert tribes imagined a cruel, warlike, misogynistic and vengeful god, and later, more civilized societies modified and "cleaned up" that god to more closely match the mores of their times.Personally, I would be a deity who creates less powerful beings (otherwise I wouldn't remain their god for long) and give them absolute free will. I would let all my creatures live in an Eden-like world, for I created them and am responsible for their success and happiness. Since they are not flawed creations (I only do perfect things) they don't need rules.

 

 

I think I could summerize all four into one answer.A Logical diety, that makes bit of sense.

 

 

4.What will you do with those beings who break your rules?

I would give them eternal existence filled with unspeakable pain. Their suffering would never end, never. As every nerve of their bodies feel the pain of the flames, their despair would still increase exponentially when they realize that their torment will never end, ages rolling upon ages. What would you do, Thumbelina?

 

 

 

@ Brakeman

LOL., you'd be one messed up God. I'm glad God isn't like that, otherwise we would be worse off than we are now.

....................................

 

@ Florduh

"I, for one, am not a critic of any gods. There are none to criticize."

Yeah but you CAN"t disprove that God doesn't exist huh?

 

 

 

"... each person would likely imbue their deified self with anthropomorphic qualities that reflect their individual values and societal norms."

Yup, I agree, that happened to the devil. He fell in love with himself and then he foisted his evil attributes on God.

" I think that explains why barbaric Bronze Age desert tribes imagined a cruel, warlike, misogynistic and vengeful god, and later, more civilized societies modified and "cleaned up" that god to more closely match the mores of their times."

I think you're right there also. I believe the bible, I believe it to be God's love letter to us and God allowed witnesses to record what happened for our benefit ( read Heb.11 for context) .

 

"Personally, I would be a deity who creates less powerful beings (otherwise I wouldn't remain their god for long)"

Very smart cuz that is exactly what God did. If a being is created then it CANNOT be a God; you can't have deity without eternity.

" ...and give them absolute free will."

God gave ALL of His creatures free will.

" I would let all my creatures live in an Eden-like world, for I created them and am responsible for their success and happiness."

That is what God did; all His creatures were made perfect but some corrupted their free will and ended up becoming evil (the bible says evil is anything apart from God cuz God is good.)

 

"Since they are not flawed creations (I only do perfect things) they don't need rules."

 

Really? try running this planet without these rules : Honour thy father and thy mother (God is the ultimate parent); Thou shalt not kill;Thou shalt not commit adultery;Thou shalt not steal;Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour; Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.

 

What would this planet be like if these rules weren't there huh? It would be even worse than it is now.

God is a God of variety; He created some beings more powerful than others and the most unique one of them all became so utterly egotistical that He wanted to usurp God. God as God CANNOT die, so that fiend incited humans to commit deicide when God put on human flesh and deicide is the ultimate crime. I mean, if sinful beings would do that to God, what would they do to each other if allowed to live eternally (hint, hint, the feud between the Jews and Muslims in the Middle East, and the devils causing death and destruction on this planet for thousands of years)?

 

.........................................

 

@ Valkyrie0010

 

"I think I could summerize all four into one answer.

A Logical diety, that makes bit of sense."

 

My friend, why doesn't God make sense to you?

 

............................................

@ nightflight

 

"I would give them eternal existence filled with unspeakable pain. Their suffering would never end, never. As every nerve of their bodies feel the pain of the flames, their despair would still increase exponentially when they realize that their torment will never end, ages rolling upon ages. "

 

Eek!!!!!! then you'd be an absolute monster of a God!!!!! Dude, what's up with that pagan teaching?

 

"What would you do, Thumbelina? "

Moi? I CAN'T improve on perfection; I would do it exactly the way Jesus did it, after all He is all wise. He made free- will beings. For those of you who are in a committed relationship, would you want your significant other to be with you because they love you or because you have a gun to their head in order for them to stay with you, or because they were pre-programmed to love you? I think we would all agree on the first question -- right?

God wants all His creatures to share eternity with Him because they love Him.

[Skankboy]

Here's a challenge to all of God's critics. If you were God and you had to create beings:

If I was a god why would i HAVE to do anything? If I was a perfect all-powerful being, why would I NEED or HAVE to do anything?

[Vigile]

Moi? I CAN'T improve on perfection;

 

Blood sacrifice is perfect? Surely you could come up with a better method of forgiveness than that.

 

Infinite time for finite crime? Disbelief = crime? Mosquitoes, ticks, flesh-eating bacteria and dengue fever?

 

Com'on man, if I had the energy I could fill an encyclopedia with better solutions.