They'd have to play guitar better than Eric Clapton

The idea made me think of Arthur C Clarke's comment: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." To me a god would be something that had advanced powers we couldn't explain. The idea of there being an all powerful, all knowing and all good god even being possible was shot down by Epicurus in the third century BC anyway.

“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”

Belief.

As gods don't exist, nothing about the non-existant god himself/herself can define their divinity.

A god is a god because idiots believe.

There is ultimately no difference between god and the loch ness monster.

if it can break the laws of reality/physics, i'll call it god

I don't know why anyone would want to have something picking and choosing parts of their lives.... I don't like the idea of having to beg or cry for help from something invisible. I don't want to ask myself why a god would let something happen or ask why people are sick or die early. I don't want to live a parent / child relationship with an intangible supernatural.

People's delusions...and an extraordinary need to believe in something.

The Norse gods weren't even immortal and the Greek gods were not always benevolent. I believe the monotheistic gods generally need omnipotence, omnipresence and omniscience. If granted those 3, I don't think we can grant benevolence. The other thing that is rarely mentioned is consciousness. I think it is that consciousness which allows god to be finicky and malevolent at his whim.

I'm going to go with pecs and abs. All gods have perky pecs and defined abs. Legs are important too. Gods have nice legs. And the godlier they are, the less they wear so we can see how godly they are. Brad Pitt, in Troy, for example... defines what is a god.

To me... God is predefined by Christians to the point it is ridiculous. How can God of the Universe be defined in a bible box determined by a group of men in power and wealth and limited by 2000 years ago from a planet that is only a speck of dust in the scope of the entire universe. If you believe, you have an eternal soul/spirit in you then you are a part of God eternal. There is no heaven or hell, there is only love. Heaven and Hell are the carrot and stick tools to control the masses to do horrific things to one another. The history of Christiandom is horrific to conform to their beliefs. Duality only exist in the reasoning mind of this existence without knowing your true spiritual self.

We must believe it is more powerful than us, more wise than us, and ultimately has our best interest at heart in spite of its propensity for punishing us. In other words, a parent surrogate.

Check out John Wathey’s “The Illusion of God’s Presence: the biological origins of spiritual longing”

1. I think so but that creates a paradox. If it doesn't then man is god in any sense that there could be one.
2. See #2.
3. The universe has no intent or reason. Our simple minds use evil and suffering as a way to acknowledge the things we don't like about existence.
   

A god is what ever people put their faith in. It's make believe, their are no rules. Sience has rules. Belief in gods has no rules only followers, believers.

I’m more interested in how the concept of god itself originated, of which I accept probably happened 10s of thousands of years ago or more. I don’t really care what the characteristics are, such as omnipresent or omnibenevolent. Doesn’t matter. It happened as a result of our insatiable human quest for answers, because of our large brains and prefrontal cortex. Jesus or any other current interpretation of god never entered their conscious brains, but humans about 40,000 years ago had some kind of ability to have abstract thought, and formulated theories about the reasons behind phenomona. (Inventing a “god” for what caused lightening strikes or thunder, for instance, or conceptualizing another realm of existance for which the dead go to. (After life) God is a romanticized extrapolation of our own egotistical consciousness. So they most likely had their own dogma that explained things they couldn’t understand. Arguably, having this ability could have been beneficial to survival by easing one’s mind in terms of the unexplainable by supplying it with an explainer.(god) The non-anxious mind would go on to be better fighters, and survivors and reproducers.

Another possibility: We figured out what made ancient civilizations run smoothly and the most efficiently by trial and error, or by whatever knowledge we had at the time. Then, we applied some kind of metaphysical hypothetical presence, (god or gods) that could smite you or your family in some way, shape or form, if you went against the flow of society. Those acts being considered “evil.” And only the leaders and rulers could know about the true nature of these “gods.” The leaders and rulers knew that some people were smart and knew that really wouldn’t get smited from the sky, so the used actual physical punishment like beheadings and lashings and crucifixions as a deterrent to prevent anyone from going against the status quo.

Six NBA championships. Hitting 400 in a season. Rushing for more than 2000 years in a season. Being the first to break the 4 minute mile. Starting Playboy magazine.

To create a god, any god/goddess first you need to make your deity Completely Invisible, Intangible and Completely Unapproachable THEN you next need to find as many Gullible people as possible who are willing to worship your creation.

I don't believe in god, so I don't guess I have my own definition, but the omnimax god doesn't exist obviously. I'm not agnostic on that god, because the description of it proves it doesn't exist. I'm only agnostic on a god that has some vague definition that no one can possibly prove one way or another.

it makes it more reasonable

Evil is a matter of perception. I think the basis for most 'god' archetypes is creation of 'the known and unknown universe'. Beyond that, it is a point of subjectivity. A reflection of ones own needs. The 'anti-god' or 'adversary' is generally a 'blame all'. And then you get into the moral ambiguities of suffering, how can a deity allow it, why me, etc. But that is a very humanistic approach to god, right? I know that if I hadn't suffered, I wouldn't have enjoyed all the not-suffering nearly as much. Suffering made me tough enough to handle other sufferings and gave me empathy to see other people's suffering and feel for them. Defining the qualities of a god is like saying how big is the universe...or multi-verse, if you believe such things, or each of the 13 dimensions, if you believe that sort of thing....fun to muse on, and great to ask, but you won't get the answer, but you may come up with interesting questions and temporary answers to other concepts.

Is Aries omnibenevolent? How about Loki? Or Ra? No, these are characters made by humans to explain natural phenomena. As all gods are. They don't need anything other than a human to make them up.

I do.

Not "like human" for sure. Be omnimax at from the infinity and be "like human" is non-sense

If the Christian god is omnimax he let a lot shitty things happened on his watch. For example why couldn't he forgive original sin and not kill his son to do it.

What makes a God a God is the willingness to forsake your rational mind to gain comfort.

Okay, you describe the attributes of a god. If it lacks anyone of the afore mentioned attributes, then no he/she would not be a god. Now, as for the position of the agnostic. I think there is more to the problem. Perhaps they have not rationality thought it out, or they are too afraid to make the leap. (sorry for using Søren Kierkegaard phrase or part the first part, leap of Faith" ) I also believe that many agnostics are not willing to go against Pascal's wager. This is my opinion I would like to here from an agnostic.

“Pascal's Wager” is the name given to an argument due to Blaise Pascal for believing, or for at least taking steps to believe, in God

Hypothetically speaking, I don't think omnibenevolence is a necessary quality for a god. In fact, a god or gods who isn't/aren't omnibenevolent seem/s rather more probable even if the probabilities remain remote.

The Olympian gods were close to omniscient, it seems, but had varying degrees of presence and power (close to omnipotence within their assigned bailiwick, but even so probably not entirely). They certainly weren't omnibenevolent. Approximately the same could be said of the Norse gods.

I think the word "god" has been needlessly elevated by the Christian tradition. To qualify as a god in my view, the entity would need to be about as powerful as a traditional major demon, yet not be as consistently devoted to evil (or it would be a demon).

That said, from a scientific standpoint, I agree that any extant entity with more limited powers would simply be described as an alien, not a god or demon - unless it were somehow native to Earth (i.e., not an alien, but, even so, scientists would not call it a god). Scientifically speaking, only a hypothetical creator of the universe would qualify as a god - so omnipotent, yes; omniscient and omnipresent, quite possibly; omnibenevolent, I seriously doubt it.