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Single Idea 22737
[filed under theme 28. God / C. Attitudes to God / 5. Atheism
]
Full Idea
The Divine is not incorporeal, since that is inanimate and insensitive and incapable of any action; nor is it a body, since that is subject to change and perishable; so the Divine does not exist.
Gist of Idea
An incorporeal God could do nothing, and a bodily god would perish, so there is no God
Source
Sextus Empiricus (Against the Physicists (two books) [c.180], I.151)
Book Ref
Sextus Empiricus: 'Against the Physicists/Against the Ethicists', ed/tr. Bury,R.G. [Harvard Loeb 1997], p.81
A Reaction
I find this quite persuasive. An incorporeal God has to be ascribed magical powers in order to interact with what is corporeal. A corporeal God is subject to entropy and all the depredations of the physical world.
Related Idea
Idea 22736
God's sensations imply change, and hence perishing, which is absurd, so there is no such God [Sext.Empiricus]
The
35 ideas
with the same theme
[denial of the existence of any gods]:
14829
|
Homer so enjoys the company of the gods that he must have been deeply irreligious
[Homer, by Nietzsche]
|
407
|
Mortals believe gods are born, and have voices and clothes just like mortals
[Xenophanes]
|
408
|
Ethiopian gods have black hair, and Thracian gods have red hair
[Xenophanes]
|
5956
|
Anaxagoras was charged with impiety for calling the sun a lump of stone
[Anaxagoras, by Plutarch]
|
7488
|
Anaxagoras was the first recorded atheist
[Anaxagoras, by Watson]
|
1551
|
He said he didn't know whether there are gods - but this is the same as atheism
[Diogenes of Oen. on Protagoras]
|
542
|
Fear of the gods was invented to discourage secret sin
[Critias]
|
338
|
Socrates is accused of denying the gods, saying sun is stone and moon is earth
[Socrates, by Plato]
|
1543
|
He denied the existence of the gods, saying they are just exaltations of things useful for life
[Prodicus]
|
535
|
The gods are just personified human benefits
[Prodicus]
|
278
|
If astronomical movements are seen as necessary instead of by divine will, this leads to atheism
[Plato]
|
149
|
There isn't a single reason for positing the existence of immortal beings
[Plato]
|
2632
|
Speusippus said things were governed by some animal force rather than the gods
[Speussipus, by Cicero]
|
3029
|
Stilpo said if Athena is a daughter of Zeus, then a statue is only the child of a sculptor, and so is not a god
[Stilpo, by Diog. Laertius]
|
2639
|
Some say Epicurus only pretended to believe in the gods, so as not to offend Athenians
[Epicurus, by Cicero]
|
5731
|
Why does Jupiter never hurl lightning from a blue sky?
[Lucretius]
|
2641
|
Why believe in gods if you have never seen them?
[Cicero]
|
5957
|
Absurd superstitions make people atheist, not disharmony in nature
[Plutarch]
|
22728
|
Gods were invented as watchers of people's secret actions
[Sext.Empiricus]
|
22737
|
An incorporeal God could do nothing, and a bodily god would perish, so there is no God
[Sext.Empiricus]
|
3660
|
Atheism arises from empiricism, because God is intangible
[Descartes]
|
16712
|
Atheism is an atrocious and intolerable crime in any country
[Descartes]
|
7836
|
In Spinoza, one could substitute 'nature' or 'substance' for the word 'God' throughout
[Spinoza, by Stewart,M]
|
7842
|
Leibniz was closer than Spinoza to atheism
[Leibniz, by Stewart,M]
|
19453
|
If love, goodness and personality are human, the God who is their source is anthropomorphic
[Feuerbach]
|
2887
|
I am not an atheist because of reasoning or evidence, but because of instinct
[Nietzsche]
|
2931
|
God is dead, and we have killed him
[Nietzsche]
|
2906
|
By denying God we deny human accountability, and thus we redeem the world
[Nietzsche]
|
18298
|
There can't be gods, because that leaves us nothing to create!
[Nietzsche]
|
7626
|
I do not believe in a personal God
[Einstein]
|
5207
|
If theism is non-sensical, then so is atheism.
[Ayer]
|
15295
|
Theism is supposed to make the world more intelligible - and should offer results
[Harré/Madden]
|
8243
|
Atheism is the philosopher's serenity, and philosophy's achievement
[Deleuze/Guattari]
|
23061
|
Free atheism should start by questioning its faith in humanity
[Gray]
|
19658
|
Now that the absolute is unthinkable, even atheism is just another religious belief (though nihilist)
[Meillassoux]
|