Asklemmy

I don't know, and no one has any good arguments.

A god is not required to explain anything in the universe, so I just assume a god does not exist.

In the Cristian sense of god, god has no direct effect on the world, making the question meaningless.

It would be the same as believing there is an teapot in orbit between Uranus and Neptune, too small and dark to see with any telescope. I could say it exists, and no one would be able to disprove me, but that doesn't make it real.

Strangely enough, if instead of a teapot (which at least would be possible, if hugly impractical to find) you use an entity that is invisible, intangible, does not do anything else that could allow it to be detected (most omni-gods), then billions believe it.

No. There hasn't been any evidence to convince me of the existence of such an entity.

Fuck no.

Nope.

… and would you give the same answer if asked at a checkpoint in Afghanistan?

I'm an atheist, I don't believe in the existence of any god or divine figure, nor in ghosts, spirits, etc.

Absolutely not

I dont believe in anything like gods, ghosts, magic etc

I believe in the possibility of a creator, be it a single omniscient/omnipresent/omnipowerful/etc being or some natural process we do not understand.

But do I have enough evidence to swear fealty to any particular thing that might occupy this role? Fuck no.

I can't imagine a world with god in it.

Which of the 1’000 or so proposed ones are you talking about? (The answer is no for all of them for the same reason: A complete lack of evidence)

No. I can't prove he doesn't exist but I've seen no proof he does, and it seems extremely unlikely.

It doesn't matter what I believe; what matters is that God believes in itself. Gotta keep that spirit up!

I have not since I was 14. I don't completely dismiss the possibility of one but I think it is incredibly unlikely.

But if you believe in one, have at it. As long as you are not forcing me or others to be involved, I don't care.

The more I think about it, the more I wonder if the answer is not important but how we respond to the answer (or lack of an answer) is what matters most. Different believers of the same god(s) and religion can either feed and clothe the less fortunate or genocide nations.

If there is one or more god(s) out there and their fundamental core value is love, I would think they would not care if we get the answer right or even care about acknowledgement with prayer and rituals, but they would be more interested in how we treat each other and the world that we live in by keeping love as a core value in our lives.

Yes.

No. I have no use for that hypothesis.

Yes. (I'm a protestant Christian.)

No.

Also this isn't an open-ended question.

Nope

No. The universe just is a thing that exists.

I usually understand God as meaning "Nature". Some of my religious friends also throw in there the notions of "events", " happenstance", "chance", etc. basically a mishmash of everything we cannot explain either because of its complexity, or because we don't have fitting models. On days I feel low, I like to think of the universe as having a purpose, a presence, and talk to it as if my voice reached the furthest stars, penetrated the densest nebulæ. It's obvious anthropomorphism, but it makes me feel a bit better. I can only suppose it is the same for religious people.

Yes

Not in a religious way.

All evidence points to religion being about control of the poor. For example, the Christian old testament was originally written in a language the poor could not read, and translating it was illegal. And almost all have a group at the top profiting off the many that have much less.

I was a gnostic atheist but became agnostic atheist. I am very much against organised religions, but I believe anyone should be able to believe in anything they want. At the conditions that they do not try to shove it down the throat of others or hurt anyone with their beliefs.
On God, the thing that made me change my mind is that you cannot clearly define what God is (the definition varies from person to person), so you can't be certain that it does or doesn't exist. Is God a bearded dude in the sky? Nature ? The Universe ?
As far as I'm concerned, if God exists, it would be very pretentious to think that it gives a crap about us, and even then, it would probably not be benevolent. Especially when you consider the amount of suffering happening on earth everyday.

I don't, and I find it hard to understand how people truly believe it. I guess it's a search for meaning. I don't get why people feel they need a make believe creator to set their moral compass. Having said that, as long as people don't push their beliefs on others my general philosophy is live and let live.

Yes

I don’t believe in God, although it’s very nice to have somebody to pray to when you are in a bad situation with no control. Like there is still a way for things to go right because even if you don’t have control, somebody has.

No

No.

I have a more complicated answer these days than I used to... the short answer is "no," but the caveats make it longer.

I don't believe in a god in the sense of an all knowing human type being that has thoughts and wishes and passes down commandments -- basically, not the religious kind of God.

At the same time, I appreciate a lot of the Jewish traditions I grew up with, and Judaism has a lot more lassitude around what "God" means to you. To me, it's Baruch Spinoza's conception of God ... basically, just "the universe," of which each person is an integral part.

So in a "college freshman on acid feeling one with the universe," kind of way, sure I believe in God. In a, "He got upset I masturbated way," then no, not at all.

No and I'm glad I don't, seeing all the ignorance of the world caused by religion. But I still respect people's beliefs (to a degree) like I do with my best friend. He's like a brother to me and he's devout. As long as people don't shove their beliefs into me or talk religious nonsense to me, I'm chill.

If by "God" you mean an intelligence and power that created everything, including us, no I do not. I don't think any intelligence or wisdom is enough to create this thing called universe or these bunch of universes. To me "intelligence" is a tool developed by some live beings in order to succeed and prosper in the world, not a tool to create and maintain universes.

You'll have to be more precise on the definition of God. There are quite a lot of them.

The existence of an abstract concept is provable by thinking of it. If there exists an idea that you call God, then a God exists. However, that proves nothing about its properties beyond its mere existence as an idea, including whether it pertains to any real thing. Likewise, all attributes you ascribe to that idea become part of the idea, but do not automatically prove anything about reality.

Thus, the question whether there is an idea called God is trivially answered by asking it at all, but has little bearing on anything at all.

What makes ideas useful is that they group properties, and what makes them real is that there exists an actual thing having all those properties.

Thus, the question whether a real thing exists depends on the properties of that thing, so let's tackle one:

Do I believe that there can be an omnipotent entity? No. The typical argument here is "Can God create a rock so heavy, They cannot lift it anymore?" Either answer contradicts the premise of omnipotence, unless that entity can create logical contradictions, in which case all argument and reasoning is moot anyway.

In particular, do I believe that some variation of the Abrahamic God exists? No, or at least none of those I'm aware of. That doesn't mean I'm not open to being shown otherwise.

However, the idea of an omnipotent, omniscient and all-loving God runs decidedly counter to the existence of suffering, even if we ignore (or exclude) the contradiction about omnipotence.