God's big flaw

[transmothra]

To my mind, there is nothing better than the idea that THIS is all there is, that there is no afterlife and no ultra-benevolent (yet strangely, fiercely jealous) Super-Grampa waiting to scoop us up in His arms when we die; that WE are responsible for what we do with our lives and how we shape our future as a species and individually. The idea that this is our one chance to get things right just makes life that much more important and special and precious. To me, life is sacred and holy enough without superstition or outdated ideas regarding how things work.

I also don't see any problems with the idea that we are a wonderful accident of nature (which includes, but is not limited to, life). There is tremendous beauty in chaos.

And here's a philosophical question hardly anyone ever bothers to ask:

We think of time as a line on a graph representing the space-time continuum. We know that we can move in any direction in space. There is, theoretically, nothing really stopping us from moving in any direction in time, either, if time is a fourth dimension (as has been repeatedly suggested by theoretical physicists and philosophers alike). So... we if move "backward," aren't we then uncreated? Does the flow of time alter god? Does god become cruel and sadistic depending on which direction s/he/it is facing? And does that, by definition, blast into smithereens a whole lot of god's "omnipotence"?

p.s., i used to be a hands-waving-in-the-air-for-some-reason zealous Christian as a teenager. I even destroyed my Duran Duran records over it, strangely assuming that Jesus was so egotistical that he only ever wanted to have songs all about himself. Thank [     ] i'm reformed now.

Comments

[transmothra.livejournal.com]

Well put indeed! And i'm glad you used the word maturity, which is concept that i do not think could be appropriately applied in describing the cruel bastard to whom we are introduced in the Torah.

[mjb.livejournal.com]

To my mind, there is nothing better than the idea that THIS is all there is, that there is no afterlife and no ultra-benevolent (yet strangely, fiercely jealous) Super-Grampa waiting to scoop us up in His arms when we die;

What's better, in my mind, is the idea that there is a Super-Grampa of some kind, but that he isn't waiting to scoop us up in His arms when we die. He just doesn't care (or otherwise emote) in the way that we insecure little beasts want to think he does. Or at least, he doesn't want us to count on such things, no matter how we live our lives. Anything more than that is presuming to know the nature of God, which, despite the Bible's "made us in His own image" wishful thinking, is a beef I have with pretty much everything coming from the pulpit. (Although even the assumption that He is, rather than was, could be presumptuous, too; maybe He's dead, or just busy elsewhere!)

So I essentially reach the same conclusions -- that WE are responsible for what we do with our lives and how we shape our future as a species and individually / this is our one chance to get things right just makes life that much more important and special and precious, but with an "anything's possible, including the possibility that we ourselves are God and/or God doesn't love you" line of semi-agnostic faith, rather than viewing existence in binary terms like it must either be purposeful & superstitions are true or everything's coincidence & accident. In other words, just because we might choose to reject certain people's superstitions or reasons for faith doesn't necessarily mean Super Grampa doesn't exist or never existed. We can reason and conclude all we want, but at the end of the day we're still here.

[transmothra.livejournal.com]

Wow, extremely thoughtful... as usual, you have valuable insights.

However, despite my zealous agnosticism, i'm pretty much giving up on the god possibility, as it just doesn't make enough sense to me. The universe as a giant freaky combustion engine (alternately, The Universe With Two Backs) is much more plausible, and desirable, as far as i'm concerned.

In an infinite cosmos, what need of god‽