When I mentioned “unnatural events,” I meant that as how human brains at the time perceived them to be.

You make the argument that those who are spiritual must thus believe in “intelligent design” whereas I argue that that might not necessarily have to be the case.

As I mentioned, humans attribute meaning to the universe as a default of what we are. The human brain is, after all, a “meaning-making machine.” It does not necessarily have to follow that, because their is some meaning in the existence of the universe, and some people find that meaning to be something spiritual or “supernatural,” that the universe was therefore created by some man who sits in a cloud and wields thunderbolts.

True, that is what religion has always been. Humans have always created stories to attribute meaning and therefore “gods” were idealized. However, I think that they are all manifestations of the major ideal which involves spirituality embedded in the essential meaning of existence.

Mark, though I understand your point: that there are still things that the human mind has as yet been unable to grasp, it does not mean that we cannot.
Your example concerning the forces of the universe is a good one, but we have come a long way since Newton. I refer you to Einstein’s theory of gravitation, relativity, quantum mechanics. Humans are getting closer and closer to knowing more and more than we ever have before. THAT sense of the supernatural is quickly receding.

You ask a brilliant question! I am Christian and I will offer my explaination of why I believe in God and not Zeus.

The difference, for me, lies in the difference between material and spiritual, which can be best explained as host and guest; God is host, concerned with all aspects of life, and Zeus acts as a guest, concerned with what can be gained in life. Zeus is a material god and God is spiritual.

I could keep going as to my understanding of the separation, but I think you get the idea! I hope this helps. =]

Sam

As a follow up to your question concerning phenomenon that I reject as there being nothing to it in the long run.

I know you’re looking for things like the causes of diseases and atmospheric disturbances and even the workings of human reproduction, but these are matters that explain why “Zeus” went by the wayside.

These will sound contrary to what you are driving at.

Here are a couple of items which explain why I don’t rule out the supernatural.

1) Most scientific minds that deny supernatural events would state that immediate and at hand actual cause and effect relationships can be linked to former and similar cause and effect relationships that do not need to exceed parameters that the human mind can imagine.

If this is the case there never was a first cause beyond which the human mind can say that the natural world can’t explain itself.

However, naturalism seems to consistently add more and more cataclysmic events into the fray which many would say are supra-natural if not meta-natural.

2) Simply stating a scientific or a mathematical pattern exists does not explain why these exist.

Even for the centuries since Newton’s description of the understanding of the “how” of universal gravitation, we still seem unable to grasp the perspective needed to fully connect why the relationship of attraction between masses exists in the first place.

Where is Newton’s answer for the unbalance created by only an attractive force between masses? His own third law appears to be violated by universal gravitation. Why are we content to let the description suffice and dismiss further questioning of the “why?” Are we unable to say that our minds really can’t grasp what’s really going on? Are there things that exist that are just beyond the limits of our physical abilities to detect (supernatural) that some on occasion have had the ability to grasp in some strange way that is not by the use of a basic natural physical sense?

Does a spiritual realm exist that is not fiction? I think so, whether its is scientific or not.

Since we use our intelligence to organize, order and adapt our environment to our needs, we tend to believe that order can only be achieved through intelligent intervention.

From the belief tha order must be created through intelligent intervention comes the idea that some omnipotent intelligent entity must have created everything and since we assume the entity is intelligent then it must have a reason to make every thing including each of us.

But the very foundation of the expansive reasoning is faulty. Order does not require intelligence.

Perhaps the supernatural is actually quite normal indeed. Perhaps we simply do not have the capacity as humans in our current scientific era to understand its implications.

Essentially, the idea of a “God” is more than just a belief in a supernatural father or other that exists with us in the universe but a human cry for uniqueness in the universe. The infinity that is the universe can never be understood, and is probably quite meaningless, and yet many choose to attribute some meaning to the existence of humans. It just so happens that, over the centuries, humans have called this psychological other their “god.” An interesting name of the Abrahamic God Yahweh was that he was also called “I Am.”

It is the essential question of Being. Existing in the universe. Creating meaning as a personal Being. Existential though it may be, it is the main question of every religion, and the reason why people turn to it. Though you don’t need a god for that (existentialists will definitely know this), some choose to create that extra level of meaning, and perhaps that is God.

Whether Scrooge thought he had dreamed or not, the impact of his internal state upon his mental outlook totally changed the type of person he was - even though the literature is fiction. The Greek Gods became fiction when the philosophers (mostly naturalistic) no longer had a need for them.

I guess it really comes down to whether you have need of a creator or not. That’s probably the only thing you would find supernatural about any God in the first place.

You wish to believe their is no good reason for anything about life in general outside of physical world. Those who believe in the possibility of the supernatural of course believe otherwise.