In a closed thread,

https://www.exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,2275946

Dave the Atheist asked,

"So you get to define god any way you want ?
God is now a Higgs Boson?"
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I use the word, god, the way the great cosmologists like Einstein defined it,

"...when asked about God, Kaku is likely to quote Einstein’s suggestion that there are two types of god: “One god is a personal god, the god that you pray to, the god that smites the Philistines, the god that walks on water. That’s the first god. But there’s another god, and that’s the god of Spinoza. That’s the god of beauty, harmony, simplicity.”

It’s that second “God” to which Kaku is drawn. He tells innovation tech today that the universe could have been random, but that instead “Our universe is rich; it is beautiful, elegant.”

https://bigthink.com/robby-berman/michio-kaku-believes-in-god-if-not-that-god

As to the 2nd question, "God is now a Higgs Boson?"

Like I said, "God is short for God Particle (Higgs Boson)" which isn't a particle, it's more of a universal field, pervading and animating the universe, very similar to what the ancient Greek Stoics called, Logos,

"the active reason pervading and animating the Universe. It was conceived as material and is usually identified with God or Nature. The Stoics also referred to the seminal logos ("logos spermatikos"), or the law of generation in the Universe, which was the principle of the active reason working in inanimate matter. Humans, too, each possess a portion of the divine logos."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logos#Stoics

"In the begining was the Logos. The Logos was with God and the Logos was God." John 1:1 (in the original Greek, which has since been lost in translation to English)

The original Greek, Logos, is more accurately translated as "Tao" (The way of Nature) in Chinese versions of the Bible.

Lexicographers

So do Dyslexicographers get to define the word of Dog?

That's fine with me.

They are apparently already attempting to do so.






ETA: Of course, I misread your "Dog" as "God," which must say something although I know not what.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/30/2019 04:14PM by Lot's Wife.

Doesn't matter. Define God anyway you want. Everyone always has. However . . .

What matters is that when you are talking with someone about God--as in any important conversation---define your terms. Because . . .

"If we are discussing horses it would seem out of place to mix in donkeys and proceed to discuss them all together." Norman Totten

I just want ghawd to be happy. He's got lazy down pat...



Can you imagine Kori/Shrodingerscat ever coming up with his very own definition of ghawd?

If you are going to drop names, Einstein is a very smart choice.

Einstein/Spinozza/Sagan/Hawking/Kaku all defined the word, god, the same way, as the laws that govern nature, which is my working definition.

And the name dropping continues!


I googled the 10 weirdest Gods and Goddesses ever and guess what? The God of Abraham made the list.

Quite a fun read. Einstein apparently was very unimaginative or just wanted to dodge the question with his definition of God, or as I call it, side-stepping. Everybody gets to define their own. yay.

So for the weirdest, you got horny old Pan, Isis sewing up a dismembered and scattered-across-Egypt Osiris in order to have sex with him again and have Horace, and my favorite, Dionysus, the Greek god of wine, intoxication, chaos, and ritual frenzy. This androgynous god began life as a premature baby when his mother died after gazing upon the glory of his father, Zeus. Unable to survive on his own, Zeus sewed Dionysus into his thigh until he was able to be reborn.

Crazy? Not after reading about Abrahamic god making a woman from a rib. So much more believable.

And then, when discovered by Hera, Dionysus was driven mad and forced to wander the Earth. On at least two occasions he was kidnapped by sailors, though Dionysus turned the oars of their boats into snakes and the sailors into dolphins.

Meanwhile God of the Bible was turning staffs into snakes and having men swallowed by whales, sending plagues of frogs, turning women into salt, and all while his son walked on water and turned water into wine.

Now those were some Gods! It is a big leap from what Gods have always been traditionally to, yawn, "laws that govern nature." But whatever floats your boat! Gonna be hard to get people to donate tithes and offerings to that though.

I was loving this and then encountered the reference to me.

So what do you call something even greater than love?

Well done, D&D.

I don't want people to donate tithes and offerings to god.
I just want to offer people an alternative to the reflexive black or white thinking CULTs like MORmONism tend to foster.
There are far more choices than Theism or Atheism. Pantheism is a great alternative, one that the wisest of wise men have been maki g since long before patriarchal Monotheism came along.

"I just want to offer people an alternative"

Wait, I thought proselyting on the board wasn't allowed.

Do you really think that if you don't constantly post the same name dropping nonsense that no one will know about pantheism? That you are the sole messenger for that belief system? If that's why you keep posting the same repetitive threads, I assure you, you can stop. People know about pantheism. You don't have to be it's missionary here.

nothing more or less than "the laws that govern nature" is just absurd sophistry.

Who created the laws that govern nature?

Do the laws that govern nature respond to prayers and offerings?

Do the laws that govern nature have independent will or volition?

Are the laws that govern nature essentially nothing more than the equivalent of apps or programs that establish a coherent structure?

Despite the diversity of beliefs concerning god or gods, the concept of deity has traditionally never been about impersonal, non-thinking laws of nature that have no volition.

The ridiculous attempt at twisting long-established meanings into their opposite does not enlighten or educate. And appeals to authority based on quotes from people who were speaking far outside their areas of expertise fail to prove anything.

Speaking of dropped names, and Einstein's in particular; I wonder whether Kori/SC is familiar with the definition of insanity that is commonly attributed to Einstein.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/31/2019 12:37PM by GregS.

Depends on who the "who" is.

Among Jews, how to define the words [plural; Jews have multiple, simultaneous, terms for God--and each term has layers of obvious, or suggested by the texts, meaning] is an on-going discussion/debate which has been actively underway since the birth of Judaism, and will be on-going for the rest of time during which Jews are a part.

To a Jew, every person has [in effect] the right to define God for him/herself--before, during, and after taken-for-granted lifetime study (either formal study, under a recognized teacher or a teaching establishment such as a yeshiva, or an adult [doesn't mean you have to be chronologically an adult] study group....and also: always, always, always through personal study).

Discussions on the definition of the word "God" have been an on-going, animated, motivated, and deeply important part of Jewish daily life since the study of the important biblical ["Old Testament"] personages and activities began.

These discussions specifically include what are now termed "atheistic" definitions. Spinoza, Einstein, and the Jewish movement ("denomination") Secular Jewish Humanism are, almost always, important parts of these discussions (even amongst the most "traditionally" theistic). (There are many atheistic/pantheistic Jews, dating from at least the near beginnings of these kinds of discussions.)

So to a Jew, the answer to the question "who gets to define the word, God?" is: every Jew (for him/herself).

There is no, overarching, "right" answer (basically, the REAL answer is considered to be beyond our human ability to conceive/comprehend, so we each do the best we can with what we have, or what--with study--we can acquire).

As a Jew, you study, you discuss with others, and you gradually begin to figure it out for yourself....and, to a large extent, this will be the constantly evolving, constantly unfolding, "backbone" of "your," or any Jew's, life.



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 12/30/2019 06:53PM by Tevai.

I really wish the pop science publicists had chosen another catchy name for the Higgs boson than the "God Particle", it's profoundly misleading.

Yes, the field permeates spacetime. Just like electromagnetism, gravity and the strong interaction. All fields have their representative particles; all force carriers (paricles) have their omnipresent field.

I'm fine with the comparison between the Higgs mechanism enabling the emergence of mass to the Greek concept of Logos as a metaphysical force carrier enabling a divine presence...as long as it's kept metaphysical. A nice metaphor. Or as a construct to better help people understand your thoughts on a what a Spinozan, pantheistc or pandeistic, less personal, more "grand clockwork" God is. Totally fine with me if you use that terminology as a comparison, I just have to assert a reminder that the Higgs boson/weak interaction is not supernatural, nor are the other fundamental forces. These are not conscious entities. Otherwise we'd be polytheists and have to pray to our light sockets. Imagine if the TBMs in our lives got sucked in by some guru who claims to communicate with or get favors from the weak interaction and raises tithing to 20%?

Don't get me wrong. What you believe or pray to is really your own business, and you can certainly go along fine in life equating the weak force with the Logos if it works for you. For personal reasons, I need to post the general scientific definition of the Higgs boson for other readers to consider. My source for this is credible, a maternal cousin with a PhD in physics and specialty in high-energy particle interactions who teaches at the university level and has explained to us over many a Skype conversation about how all the little winky bits interact with each other.

The Higgs boson is not related to social, psychological or cultural concepts in any way, other than it enables mass to exist, some of which mass makes up human brains, which are prone to asking questions. The Higgs boson is related to the weak interaction, which is still fairly poorly understood in proportion to how much attention cooler cats like electromagnetism and gravity get.

None of the physicists involved in the CERN projects have ever conducted a study to inform society about the existence of a divine entity or any consciousness quality of spacetime. They were looking for a particle to fit in the puzzle of how things work on extremely micro scale. None of them use the label God particle in correspondence or research.

As far as who defines God, I suppose everyone does in their own way, but how we operate as individuals pushes and pulls with how we operate as groups. There will always be dominance hierarchies interested in behavioral control through the concept of the all-seeing eye. There will always be exploitative individuals and passive individuals who need or want to be reassured that all the answers are known. God will continue to evolve, right along humankind, as our needs and aspirations change over time.

I think Juan who runs the street taco stand around the corner should take a crack at it. His tacos are way better than Einstein's.

“I am Juan with the lord! Well you be Juan with me?”

—Juan

Who gets to define the word, God?

Looking up where the birds flew splendidly in the breeze and the stars sparkled, up there where amazing, radiant sunrays break through the clouds after perhaps a terrifying hurricane, the early humans could see beauty and experience reprieve from the earthly pestilence they were experiencing on the ground.

As they looked up, these humans were certain they had seen something, or perhaps, even someone in that break in the clouds - something or someone who was there to assist them. And so they called out, they pleaded, yes they prayed and prayed some more, and suddenly their child's lingering fever broke. The child would live and god/gods were born/defined by humans.

I do.