God is such a big question, and I think a question far more complex and impossible to even approach than most people realize, that I tend to question both people who say they believe in God and those who say they don’t believe in God.

Einstein said the problem of God was the “most difficult in the world,” a problem that couldn’t be answered with a “yes or no,” and one ”too vast for our limited minds.”

Though a hardcore agnostic, I tend to find that when most atheists I encounter say they don’t believe in God they aren’t even talking about God. They think they’re talking about God, but they aren’t.

But. don’t worry, I’m equally skeptical of most theists.

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In the picture, which cyclist is going fastest? Most will say the cyclist on our left is going the fastest and the one on the right the slowest.

There are, however, unanswered and unanswerable questions that make it impossible to know. Did they start at the same place? Did they start at the same time? Are they moving forward or backward? Are they moving? I’ve seen sprint cyclists stand still during a race. Even if it’s a normal 1-2-3-Go! race, it’s possible the guy on the right is going the fastest and the guy on the left the slowest at the moment the image was shot. Catching up, slowing down and switching positions are normal parts of all races.

The initial guess was made on a made-up simplified explanation to a complex and unanswerable image.

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ATTRIBUTION SUBSTITION

In cognitive psychology, attribution substitution is an automatic subconscious process that the mind uses to make speedy decisions needed to function, but that contributes to many cognitive biases, misperceptions and visual illusions. It is a heuristic, or mental shortcut, used when someone has to make a judgment about a complex, ambiguous situation and substitutes a more easily solved situation.

The substitution is done at the automatic subconscious level and the person does not realize he or she is actually answering a related but different question. This helps explain why many individuals can be unaware of their own biases and even persist in the bias when they are made aware of them.

An example is when you judge the intelligence or beliefs of a stranger by his or her looks, fashion, age, race, sex, accent or nationality. Determining a person’s intelligence and beliefs is a complex question and must be done at the closely examined person-by-person level. However, even those who claim they don’t, make automatic judgments from their stereotypes (simplified generalizations) before they’ve talked to the person or even when shown a picture. As said, this is an innate automatic process.

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ART JUDGMENTS

People judge a work of art by deciding what they think it is– how the pieces fit together, what is its intended meaning, genre, etc– then judging that. When someone says a work of art is trite and silly, what he is saying is his interpretation of what is the art is trite and silly.

I didn’t say the work can’t also be trite and silly.

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“DO YOU BELIEVE IN GOD?”

Answering this question “Yes” or “No” is an example of attribution substitution.

God (and I’m not making a statement there about whether or not God exists or my personal sentiments) is impossible to define. Even theologians know and say that ‘God’ itself is just a human-made word, and God is beyond human definition, language and conception. Asking if someone ‘believes in God’ is, as my professor dad would phrase it, is a non-question. One hundred different people have 100 different incomplete and subjective definitions and conceptions. Thus, all the person is actually answering is if he believes in the existence of his personal definition or conception of God which isn’t and cannot be the true or accurate depiction of God. You can’t believe in what you don’t know. Two of those people may say Yes to the question, but, as their definitions and conceptions differ, they do not believe in the same thing.

An anti-theist, or someone who answers “No,” is using the same attribution substitution process. She is making up a personal definition and conception of God, or using someone else’s definition and conception of God, then saying that that does not exist.

In short, belief in God (as a real thing, rather than an artificial conception) or belief that God doe not exist is a question that is impossible for a human to answer. The question itself is nonsensical or a “non-question,” as it’s asking for an answer as to the existence of something that question doesn’t and cannot define.

Or as I respond when someone asks me if I believe in God, “I cannot answer that. However, if you give me your definition of God I’ll tell you if I believe in that.”