Debate: Is belief in God for the GREATER GOOD?
Side: No, for the greater good.

I'll pass on the book, but thank you. I read his bio though and it was interesting. I find the deist point of view more rational than the majority of theist thoughts.The problem is that all the devices you use do it; reason, logic, your mind, thought, reflection, moral assessments etc. and the morality, ethics, rules etc you come up with are not characteristics of matter nor are they physical in nature. Okay, this is like St. Anselm's Ontological theory. It was supposed to basically be a one page strictly cerebral proof of the existence of some god. It takes a similar premise which I think is provable, that humans are incapable of creation. Every idea we have comes from something we observe; and you can try if you like, it's kind of fun, attempt to imagine something new, a new fantastic creature perhaps, you'll find no matter how crazy an idea you come up with, it can be traced to things observed piece by piece. Everything is an exaggeration, or a combination of things etc, but it's all traceable to the real world.He took this basic fact of the human mind, and put forth the idea that man long ago came up with this idea of something "greater than which nothing else can exist." Since this is an ephemeral thought, and in itself it would seem to be untraceable, man must on some level have experience of it. Therefore, "something than which nothing else can exist" must be real. And this we call god, and then of course there's a million definitions and theories about this being, but at the center it must be based on some unknowable truth.He studied philosophical works, especially Socrates and Plato of course, and very much seemed to be influenced by the very persuasive argument that we exist with all knowledge in some form before birth, and at birth, we somehow forget, and learning is simply memory. It seems to be the same kind of thought process.Which is interesting.But my reply is simply. 1. in response to St. Anselm, we cannot really imagine "something than which nothing greater can exist" we simply exaggerate on to infinity, and describe it as such. Ex. I can say "infinity" referring to say just numbers. But I know that there is no such thing because one can always add a 0 at the end. At the same time, while I can say infinity, and can have a general concept of the idea while at the same time knowing it is not a real thing, really I cannot even begin to imagine really large numbers. No one can really imagine for example how many a trillion is. We hear that number all the time, but the reality is beyond our comprehension when converted to anything real. Yet, a trillion does not even begin to approach "infinity" and in fact, we run into the number "trillion" all the time, in the deficit, the number of stars, sand on the beach, etc. It's everywhere. But beyond our comprehension none the less.Now that obviously could be turned into a pretty sermon about god, how something can be in front of us, while we do not comprehend it.lol, and I just realized how cute a point that would be. Probably make a million turning it into a little poem or something - "foot prints in the sand" and all that :)but the point is, our ability to have what seem to be higher-level thoughts, "reason, logic, your mind, thought, reflection, moral assessments etc. and the morality, ethics, rules etc" as you say,are very much characteristics of matter and are I believe of a physical nature.So, 2. In response to your point I would say that these things are a part of the natural world. reason, logic, reflection, ethics, even the morality that began this entire sideline to the debate, are all things I believe that developed naturally in humans, and many many mammals with relatively large brains, from observing the benefits of this kind of social behaviour.A chimpanzee can learn (From "Bonobo: the forgotten ape") for example, that if he brings a lover food, she will have sex with him later. When he does not, she does not. So they learned to share. Even in them, this took a certain amount of reflection. These primates had to look at them self, and on some level say "I want sex" then, their actions in pursuit of what they determined through self-reflection appears, and may well be, morality.Through time, we observe the fruits of our actions both from our own experience, and with our capacity to imagine what others have experienced. This leads over hundreds of thousands of years of evolution, experience, breeding with those who act in a similar way, etc, generation after generation, to a people (us) who appear to have a capacity for morality, reflection, moral judgment,when the hundreds of thousands of years of the trial and error of evolution are not taken into consideration,I admit it can appear quite miraculous, and I can see how one may feel something "greater" must be an architect of sorts. Even if this architect isn't really around to talk to like deists believe.But given the progression over generations. I don't feel these higher-level human characteristics necessitate the existence of a greater being. Sure, they are not "characteristics of matter nor are they physical in nature." But they are results of physical nature, hundreds of thousands of years of physical nature.Now, to the debate. "Is belief in God for the GREATER GOOD."I do not believe it is. We are capable of all the good, and all the evil on our own, with or without a god. And I do not like one using god as an excuse for good or for evil. I believe it is people, always was people, and always will be people, and it is better to be aware of that even if it should be the case that people couldn't handle this idea. I think though they could handle it just fine though if t hey tried.