Do We NEED God?

This topic is for those who assume/believe that God either exists or may exist.In the Book Nook in another topic, Ringo and I had this exchange: I personally believe that we humans need a Creator/mentor all wise guide that encourages and inspires humanity to fulfill our best aspirations. Perhaps our greatest strength is our personal and societal responsibility for our own destiny, but I believe that we are flawed in the ability to achieve this goal.Faith/Belief?

Thread copied here from the Do We NEED God? thread in the Proposed New Topics forum.

OK, I highly doubt it, but God may exist. The world does seem to have a lot of problems than some on hands "Godding" could do a lot of good. End some wars, etc, etc., etc.Moose

Why? Having a responsibility isn't a strength. Why?And what, specifically, is the goal?

We all NEED something, don't we?So it's going to be another question of the nature of god. Although, I like your term 'aspirations' - kinda godlike, I think.God has become such a polarizing term: He's an idea, someone's leader, a redeemer or a destroyer. God is a creator or a creation of our human imagination. Sorry, but it's all been done before.I've come to a place where a god may exist, but it's such a meaningless term TO ME that concrete needs outweigh any argument spent on the question. I guess I've stopped asking God for help and I look to others for my needs.

No, Phat, YOU "need" a god character, or at least the belief in one, because you think you'd be lost without it. Us atheists do just fine without this god character or the belief in one.

I think humans need "ideals". We need things that "encourages and inspires humanity to fulfill our best aspirations".If you want to anthropomorphicise and/or personlise these ideals and call it "GOD" (or whatever) then I suppose you can. Certainly a lot of people seem to need to do this...... True perfection has to be imperfect - Wise words from that noted philosopher Noel Gallagher.

Didn't Timothy Leary say something similar about LSD?Addicts "need" their drug. They won't die without it but they might wish they were dead. I agree completely. I fully expect that some day we will fail to meet the challenge and become extinct. It's happened to more successful species than ours.The problem with "needing" some Higher Power to solve our problems for us is that we've never found one that will do it reliably. Your favourite is actually promising to wipe us out some day. I see that as a problem rather than a solution.

We need God because we are either unable or unwilling to lay aside our own wants and desires enough to solve the major problems of the world. Wars have always existed, for example, and dont appear to be getting any less violent. Human greed is as pervasive as ever.I am pessimistic in my expectation that humans shall ever overcome these problems on our own.As to why we are flawed, many would use the handy explanation of "original sin" but I am personally not sure...except that in my own case I won't give up the comforts that I deserve(or think I deserve) only to help someone else. well..I will...but only to a degree.

And you have evidence of some God that makes people able and willing to lay aside their own wants and desires enough to solve the major problems of the world?

This all depends on how God is defined. If we go strictly by the book,(the good book, of course ) than yes. The general idea is that imperfect humans will eventually fail and that the savior will return to save His own.(who, by the way, are "whosoever". )There is no excuse that God picks His favorites, given that whosoever believes will be saved.) This only poses a problem for those who refuse to believe. Even those who can't believe will eventually be given enough evidence to cast a free vote aye or nay.add by edit: And God is defined not only by the god book but by philosophical consensus. Nobody really knows that God, if God exists, is anything as we imagine. We can speculate, however.Edited by Phat, : added stuff

Personally I believe that people will change their tune once the status quo becomes unlivable.
A guy may not want higher taxes until the road becomes so full of potholes that he finds himself paying more for a mechanic than he would have paid in higher road taxes, for example.Perhaps God won't ever make a return appearance to simply bail us out. Perhaps She foreknows that life will become more and more difficult until we globally learn that consensus is preferable to anarchy.

Does you answer have anything to do with the question?Do you have evidence of some God that makes people able and willing to lay aside their own wants and desires enough to solve the major problems of the world?If humans will decide to change once things get so bad that they have no choice is there any need of a God?

So you're saying that we only "need" God eventually, when He comes to kill everybody who doesn't accept Him?

You do realize that we are just now entering a time where a good majority of people don't believe in god, right? You do realize that, throughout history, nearly the entirety of mankind has had fanciful beliefs of some god character, right? Or are you saying "everyone needs MY god" because you've determined yours to be the right one and your god just happens to be the one that will "save mankind from itself"? Do you have any evidence that there is a god character that will assist in this "dilemma"? Funny thing about that: only you religious people seem to think humans are "flawed" and that is merely because YOU can't measure up to your imagined sky creatures. Humans are humans and we do human stuff; some bad, some good. Some bad has come from god believers and non, some good has come from god believers and non. Belief in fairy tales has done nothing for the advancement of society, but it can damn well be argued that it put the brakes on society (the middle east before islam? The dark ages?).