So along those lines, I'd say that both the good and bad are part of God's plan. If that's the case, I'd also have to say that God is not benevolent, but neither is He evil.

Another possibility is that God does not intervene at all, and/or has no plan.

To the untrained eye, such a god would look very much like one who didn't exist.

Indeed, if God has those characteristics, then life in this universe will be indistinguishable from an atheistic universe. It is possible that an afterlife exists, and we will find out more later, with death acting as an event horizon. But if death is an event horizon, then it will be impossible to prove its existence from this side.

In such a universe (non-interventionist God), we must also consider the possibilities:

- God exists, but no afterlife exists for us.
- God exists, but He had nothing to do with the Bible, nor any other human moral codes.

by your side and you talk to him. I know people who feel this way. But meaning no disrespect, I think it is very close to being, if not actually, a superstition.

There is no "God"

I believe something made this universe but we are not meant to know what, to put our own description on the indescribable shows a lack of understanding.

Which is exactly what we have, now if you could end the influence of those who use "God" to have dominion over their fellow man or woman the world would be a much better place.

Am I not correct?

I'm not against those who believe, I'm against those who use that belief to cause pain and suffering in others.

Because that's human against human and there's no "God" in there anywhere.

Just my two cents.

ll things dull and ugly,
All creatures short and squat,
All things rude and nasty,
The Lord God made the lot.
Each little snake that poisons,
Each little wasp that stings,
He made their brutish venom.
He made their horrid wings.

All things sick and cancerous,
All evil great and small,
All things foul and dangerous,
The Lord God made them all.

Each nasty little hornet,
Each beastly little squid--
Who made the spikey urchin?
Who made the sharks? He did!

All things scabbed and ulcerous,
All pox both great and small,
Putrid, foul and gangrenous,
The Lord God made them all.

Amen.

accounts for bone cancer in a 1 year old

What happens in the universe is another matter.

10 year olds have free will. We still do not allow them to torture each other.

Free will does not confer absolute power.

Is God omniscient, omnipotent and all-good? It can't be, because such a God could have created a universe with free will and without suffering.

Theists tend to reason backwards. They see a universe of suffering and conclude God must have a reason to make it so. Free will is a common choice. God is mysterious is another. But all such conflict with the usual definition of God as omnipotent etc.

Didn't think so.

And Heddi tried to bring it back to the topic, so, can you answer it? Or are you not actually here for discussion?

That is a discussion that will quickly devolve into name calling, so I spared the board the predictable responses.

That's all you have to say.

I know that when called about specifics about good theists do anything to not talk about it, had all manner of abuse hurled at me when Ive pressed the issue in the past.

Why did god choose the 1 sperm cell out of 100,000,000 or so in my father's ejaculate to fertilize my mother's egg?
For that matter, did "god" inspire my folks to get it on in the way Marvin sang about so sultry and sweet...or was he more voyeur than participant or inspiration to said cosmically important event - from MY perspective, THE MOST IMPORTANT COUPLING IN HUMAN HISTORY!!! (for without the lord providing the act-right juice to my folks, there is no "ME" 48 years later contemplating the event and magnifying it's importance in the first place!!! or is there?)

What were the criteria utilized by the uber-creator to sort through the possibilities?
What was contained in that special sperm cell that made IT the one thing in all of the universe that could lead specifically to ME?
Why and how did "god" determine that the other 99,999,999 sperm cells, genetically identical to my special sperm cell, deserved to die a fruitless existence, unable to fulfill their sole biological purpose of procreation? How for that matter did "god" make sure to get that ONE SPERM CELL into the ejaculate of my father's orgasm THAT DAY? Why was it not part of a previous 'event'? Why did it not simply die en route to the Fallopian tubes like its compatriots? HOW does god manipulate these specific tasks while STILL finding time to obsess on the goings on in the next bedroom that just so happens to have two men in it? or two women down the street? How is the minutiae so important to the believers and yet so absent in details?

Why and how did "god" decide that my genetic make-up would favor the shorter stature of my mother (5'3&quot and not the taller stature of her brothers and sisters (5' 11" to 6' 4&quot ?

Why and how did "god" decide that unlike several blighted pregnancies my mother and father had experienced prior to successful conception and delivery to term of me, that MY sperm-egg union would form a zygote that successfully implanted in my mother's uterus to become a fetus and develop to eventually become ME?

There is simply no "mystery" here....genetics and enzyme chemistry have gone a very long way towards answering nearly ALL of those above questions...but my inescapable conclusion has always been that despite the unfulfilling and humbling feelings it causes us to feel, the truth is we are ALL here by random chances that stack up and become "US". No god is creating individual people. No "soul" exists in any meaningful, measurable or confirmed nature. No "sin" exists outside of purely social and situational determinations. No "evil" exists in an objective, non-comparative manner...no "good" either.

We live and die in an immeasurable immense sea of emptiness....cut off from all other corners of the Cosmos by space, time and relativity. Humans in our current state can NEVER travel to distant locations in other galaxies to seek out other life forms and ask each other the questions we have been fighting amongst ourselves for all of human history.

A "god" that would do such wickedness as to "create" sentient, self-aware beings, who can contemplate their own existence, creation/beginning/"genesis" and wonder about their "purpose"; but then choose to cut them off from all other corners of the COSMOS by the speed of light barrier and still remain consciously aloof and outside of the physical realm of it's creation; instead offering only conflicting and mutually exclusive stories of itself among the people's "sacred" texts, traditions and stories, is no "god" worthy of anything but scorn. The equivalent of a dead-beat cosmic daddy with a drinking problem and a lack of empathy for its offspring.

Sorry. Even IF such a monstrosity existed in the physical or meta-physical realm, it is contemptible and unworthy of respect, let alone worship. Such conceptions as eternity and deity and benevolence as would entail the all-good, all-knowing, all-just creator do not abide the tales told and dogma evolved around the Christian-Jewish-Islamic "god".

(And don't even get me started on the idea of splitting itself into 3 co-equal parts, killing one as a sacrifice to another, then reversing the killing so that it did not really die, and sending the third part to the "chosen disciples" to "inspire" them to evangelize the planet...I mean, I have seen enough bad movies to recognize that a good sales pitch can get anything published...but people actually BELIEVE this tripe!! Astounding...the only thing more inane and insane is the concept of "eternal" life....a state of never-changing, never-evolving, never-ending worship of the most high, for billions and billions of eons without end or respite ... NO THANK YOU, I'll pass on the crazy.)

is interesting. Do you see the universe as an ant farm, and the deity as the farmer?

as suggested by Zhuangzi's tale of his dream:

Once I dreamt I was a butterfly but I awakened. And now I do not know if I am a man who dreamt I was a butterfly or if I am a butterfly, now dreaming I am a man

We know that we can be ignorant and confused. The question is: just how ignorant and confused are we? What should we take as real and what should we regard as delusion?