On Thu, May 7, 2009 at 11:30 AM, <daddycaylor.domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>
> On May 7, 1:42 am, Kim Jones <kimjo....domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>> So - going back to God then, let's maybe do an OPV on him/her/it
>>
>> Hint:
>>
>> If I can't do an OPV on God, then I'm not convinced that:
>>
>> 1. God is a person (100% convinced)
>>
>> 2. There is a God (74% convinced)
>>
>
> People here keep thinking that I am trying to "convince" people that
> God is a person and/or that there is a God. Let me give you a hint
> that that's not the kind of thing that I would think is worthwhile to
> try to "convince" people about my wife. ("convince" Wow, we
> westerners sure thing we have a lot of power.) And even if I thought
> that it was worthwhile, I certainly wouldn't go about try to
> accomplish that by doing an OPV with that person about my wife.
>
If we on this list believe that everything (or at least everything
with a self consistent definition) exists, then we must also believe
that all possible gods exist. Be they artificial intelligences that
occur in the universal dovetailer with access to unbounded computing
power and memory, an evolved species who reaches an omega point or
technological singularity, or anything else you might imagine. What
can we say about the personalities, behaviors and abilities of these
gods?
It is said that when intelligent people disagree, it is often due to a
difference in available data. Assuming these gods all possess
superior intellects, then they should all come to the same conclusion
when presented with the same data. Mathematics, containing universal
truths and accessible regardless of the physical universe or
environment one finds his or her self in, might serve as a platform
for all gods to reach identical conclusions regarding everything.
Perhaps they would also conclude or even prove the existence of all
else as we on the everything list believe. If it is possible, I would
expect those gods would develop a model for consciousness, which would
likely lead to the idea that other self-aware structures in math
exist, and perceive. Though no god would have the power to eliminate
what inevitably exists in math (thus explaining the problem of evil),
they would still be able to run simulations of their own over which
they may exercise full control. Perhaps the gods explore reality and
the limits of consciousness by instantiating universes and the
observers they contain, but for the god to really 'know' what it is
like to be someone else, that persons memories and experiences must
somehow be merged into the mind of that god, not simply simulated
(Like Mary the color scientist).
Thus whatever gods are simulating this universe (and inevitably some
explanations for our universe include a higher level simulation) then
we might be able to conclude some beliefs or properties of that god if
we assume that whatever truth we may find, the mind of God has already
come upon.
This is just one narrow definition of god as a creator, yet there are
certainly others. A monotheistic God might have to be equivalent to
the everything, as it would be the only object for which there are no
others, and would be the ultimate source of the existence of all else
including the 'lesser gods' discussed above. We could also choose to
define God as the collection of all first person experiences, meaning
each of us is a small part of God. Interestingly you can somewhat map
these different god definitions to the trinity from Christianity.
Jason
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Received on Thu May 07 2009 - 18:20:32 PDT