Paineful Truth has proposed a nice idea about God and god. The God with a capital G is the sentient being. The lower case
god is non-sentient. I think PT means the truth about the natural world. I am not sure. This certainly fits my religious beliefs. I would have a very hard time believing in a sentient being, personal, creator of the universe.
The natural world itself seems to be sentient, no? I mean, we’re sentient and we’re natural…
Here is the major problem (but by no means the only problem):
Okay, well there it is…‘God’ and ‘god’…two completely different things. Don’t you think it is confusing to have almost the same name for two things that are not at all the same? Isn’t it convention (and for good reason) to have different words for different things?
What is a sentient God? How would we experience a sentient God differently compared to a non-sentient god? If a God is sentient but chooses not to interact with humans, isn’t it then the same as a non-sentient god?
I wonder if the parasites inside my body realize I’m sentient.
One would argue that the parasites are not conscious but humans are conscious and can distinguish a sentient host from a non-sentient host.
How would you distinguish a sentient host? Wouldn’t you have to be outside the host in order to determine such a thing? If I was a little person inside your body, I don’t think I’d find examples of sentience anywhere.
Yeah, that’s why I wonder how turtle and TPT can distinguish a sentient God, from a non-sentient god, from a sentient God who is ignoring us. Presumably there are some indications.
I think that it is really a question of faith.
I can only speak for turtle. What I have been writing is a matter of believing. Nothing more and nothing less.
turtle,
I think what you are saying is that you believe god is the universe. Why not get rid of the word ‘god’ entirely and say: I believe in the universe. Most people would agree with that statement.
Maybe it should be phrased as :
I believe the universe.
That would make the universe sentient as well.
How so?
The question is, how or why not so?
Sentient means … of, having or capable of feeling or perception; conscious. The universe has sentient beings in it, but it is not itself sentient.
Maybe the Milky Way is sentient. Why not?
Unless you can show that the Milky Way displays some sentient characteristic, the most reasonable conclusion is that the Milky Way is not sentient. The simplest explanation which fits all the facts is the best.
There is absolutely no way you can know that. The universe could very well be sentient.
I’m not sure it’ll catch on…I fluctuate between god and God depending on how lazy I am feeling with the capital letter.
This is pretty much correct, as I said before - it is just your re-defining of god that makes god what it is for you.
Is sentience locatable? Where is my sentience? I don’t see how you could discover sentience in something bigger than you, that you yourself are part of. That’s why I made up that little thought experiment - could a parasite in your body (assume it is sentient) know that you are sentient? Or, if your little finger were sentient, could it know that your body as a whole is sentient? Is your body as a whole sentient? Again, is sentience locatable?
I think that a sentient flea riding on a human would be able to figure out that the human is sentient from its behavior.