Hi Mike,

Finaly got some free time... <s>

>>You're confusing His all-powerfullness with His choices.
>
>Lets assume god existed. If he didn't want people to suffer, and he was all powerful, he woud not let people suffer.

Not necessarily. You're presuming God would react as you think He should react. Awfully presumptuous it seems.

You don't seem to be able to get away from the idea that you want God to force people do do things that, in practice, they obviously do not want to do. Mike, people are all too often deliberately choosing evil and destructive choices. You want God to make all of your decisions for you then? Or, do you want to make your own?

I'd bet you want to make your own but if so then you need to be willing to also take the personal responsibility for the consequences of the decisions you have chosen. Yet, you seem to want to blame God for the consequences of the aggregate decisions that mankind has been making. ????

It is IMO grossly unfair for you to blame God for the consequences of the decisions that man makes.


>But, people suffer.

Yes, and often as a direct or indirect result of the decisions of other people. Additionally, God specifically stated to man that if man disobeyed Him that he (man) would die. Man chose death.

>So, either he is not all powerful, or eliminating human suffering is not something he is particularly concerned about.

Your presumptions are incorrect. God's not your puppet, nor are you His.

>
>Could be both, either way, it HAS to be one of them, correct? Whichever you choose, I don't think I want to spend my life pursuing a deity who can't live up to the hype.

Nope. As I pointed out your above two choices are false. You've mis-defined God and have drawn incorrect conclusions.

>
>At this point, your god's existence is not even desirable, much less useful.

No.. Your definition of God; not mine Mike. Mine is a lot different. <s> First you want to project your mind's definition of what God is and blame Him for it and now you're trying to do that to me. <g> Don't blame me for the wrong and incorrect definitions in your mind, ok. <s>


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>>None of which changes the facts that God created mankind and He has the right to be soverign.
>
>Facts? You mean fairy tales.

No, you mean fairy tales. I have history, knowledge, facts, and the thinking and personal testimonies of literally hundrends of millions of peole over the last 6,000 or so years or recorded history. That you choose to not educate yourself regarding these facts and project your own ignorance as 'fairy tales' is something you've constructed, not something I've asked you to believe without doing your homework.

For example...

I have all of science on my side as science is founded and grounded on the notion that the universe is ordered and that by consistent and repeating "tests" the results will always be returned in a fashion such that one can determine that order. If the universe were random then there would be absolutely no confidence possible in the scientific method - a clear fact if you think about it. Science is based upon the constancy of the material world. Nature itself submits to rules. Rules are, by definition, restrictions adn limitations placed upon something by an outside source and they also presume that that outsode source (God) has the power to enforce those "rules" - what we call, for example the Laws of Thermodynamics; One set of rules we've observed. Rules of science are completely based upon the notion that those rules (mostly theorums really) will be "true". They can only be true is they are reliable and they can only be reliable if they do not capriciously and arbitrarily change with respect to the resultt of testing those theorums. That's called "order" and order does not spontaneously arise from chaos. Order is the result of design and design is the result of thought

Face it Mike.. There is either order in the known universe - which implys a designer capable of creating that order or the universe has no order, but that violates the very "laws" mankind has constructed to explain that universe. Which is it then, is science completely wrong or is the notion that the universe is chaotic in nature but has spontaneously ordered itself in complete violation of its own fundamental and observable structure a completely false presumption designed to allow mankind to ignore the designer's hand? Or has man completely deluded himself with false and incorrect observations regarding the universe and therefore nothing anyone "knows" is in fact the actual case? I'd say that in the physical sciences man's done a pretty darn good job and that tellse me mankind does have a pretty good understanding of some things.

Forget all the silly words about so-called "fairy tales" and face the reality that the very universe you live in is an ordered universe. To so be requires design. And design requires thought. And thought requires a self-aware mind, capable of expressing itself.

God.

Or make an irrational "leap" where order emminates from chaos and in so doing creates "laws" (thermodynamics for example) that are demonstrably true only for a universe that follows and obeys "rules" - what we call scientific theorums and facts and truths. Heck.. even the fundamental naturs of the word definition of the word "truth" absolutely requires that the definition not change. Or, nothing is "knowable but if you take that route you're asserting you can know the un-knowable. But, how can you even say this as it's not "knowable"? <g>

No matter where one lands the basic presumptions regarding science are always the same: The universe is odered and by the scientific method one can discover some facets of that order. Whether it's physics, astronomy, physiology, biology, chemical or organic science; the facts are that there is and awlays has been order in those disciplines. Order, as I've already mentioned cannot be nor ever has been proven (by that same scientific method) to emminate from chaos. It just does not happen! Ergo, someone (personal god) or something (impersonal god) placed that order there. I say a personal god, but for other reasons than that which I've gone into here... A personal god is self-aware and aware of me.



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>>Your argument is with God Himself.
>
>What argument is that?

That He's not fitting your definition of Him.