Good question thecat, but as can be seen from the replies thus far, you're unlikely to get a straight answer.

Mind you, it's quite amusing to see Boazy taking someone else to task for a spelling mistake. This constituted about a third of his reply, the rest of which is compromised of dissembling designed to avoid answering the question.

Expect plenty more obfuscation and changing of the subject, but don't hold your breath waiting for empirical evidence of god/s. As freediver points out, there isn't any - by definition.

thecat, Sorry to disappoint you but "Faith" is what is left when you ignore the bible and turn your back on the dogma and mantra of the religiously inclined (as I have done).

It comes back to the big question - what created the "big bang" and what existed before it.

i find it too hard to believe it all just "happened", to believe that I would have to have an undying faith in the power of coincidence or fatalism and I would go seriously nuts if I based my existence on it all happening by accident (coincidence) or we were on some preordained path (fatalism).

All I have left is faith, a belief that some indifferent authority, which does not care about either the suffering or delight of any of us, brought the universe into existence.

It is a default view. Take it or leave it. I offer it as that, no apology and no encouragement.

You have the freewill to choose "what" for yourself, it will not effect me.

I will still observe, Mozart was an inspired genius and that genius came from somewhere.

Boaz_David is spot on.
You cannot reject the testimony of others...the eye witness account.
Its simply too vital in any issue.
As a young policeman (see my thread "My years as a young cop" for an interesting story) I would go to a scene of a crime or an accident and there would be witnesses.
I would get my notebook out and write down what they said about what they saw and heard.
This I would later take back to the station and type up; and if necessary the event would later go to a court and the Magistrate would listen to what I had written down... and even personally interview the witnesses in the box.
It was taken as eye witness testimony of the event. The truth of the event was exposed and pronounced as truth.
Out of this testimony came court decisions that change lives.
People got set free, others got fines, some went to prison.
This too is what the christians do when they speak of their personal eyewitness experience of what they were like before they came to Jesus...and what the event of the "born again experience" was like at that precise point of being touched by The Holy Spirit as He entered their lives when they confessed their sin and invited Jesus Christ in.
And theres millions of us.
And theres been millions of us with that same testimony about God, Christ and The Holy Spirit.
And we are all giving testimony to the existance of God through our eyewitness accounts.
We are the living testimony of God being The Creator and of the Holy Bible being the truth.
And we are not a cult.
We are millions of people from all nations and tribes ...all with the same "born again christian experience".
That miraculous instant in our lives when we changed forever when God Revealed Himself to us and came to live inside us by His Spirit.

Hello there... You might care to take a peek at Five Questions for Theists posts:

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=1804

I'm locked out for comment for the time being. One question addresses the "explanation" for a god existence. This a slightly different question to "Does god exist?"; and, is developed from Dawkins' observation that any entity being god must be very complex? How would it become that way? “How does God Exist?” [Sells]

Moreover, with infinite regress, why is it any less apt maintain that universes are manifestations drawn into existence from infinite indeterminacy, as in quantum mechanics; than to just say, "god"? With QM it migt be possible to draw some sort of model, as with n-manifolds and hypercube. "Explanations", in other words.

With thesists, I have found "faith" and "its not for us to know" to be common perspects, sincerely held. Also, allusions to the Intelligent Design derived the complexity of the universe, i.e., it just couldn't be happenstance, its too astonishing to have occurred without a supernatural architect.

I also think that; creation, god(s), Jesus, Zeus et al., shamanism, priesthood, and churches are separate constructs, to be independently defined. Before using any terms, one should tighten the terminology, to ensure each scale/construct displays internal consistency.

I guess the Shroud of Turin alluded to being empirical evidence but proved to be a middle-ages fake. The sun allegedly falling at Lourdes? Thousands of people are said to have witnessed the claimed phenomenon, yet that "mass experience" style of event has also occurred with UFO sighting?

Many of the arguments presented by the theists communities, start with "their" god. I in the Anglo-West world, Jesus, and, in other cultures a different god or gods: e.g., Amun-Re. Methodologically, I find it problematic to commence with an untested "a priori" proposition. The theists' approach jumps steps.

All things being equal, the simplest explanation is usually the correct one,
i will let slide the fact your post is much like laying down and saying lets wrestle.

I clearly dont need to waste words on describing god , as it is sure you will be unlikely to be seeing god anyway ,[by rejecting his egsistance it becomes even scientificlly impossable]

it would be helpfull for you to describe what branch of science you specialise in [noting there are valid sciences and theories of science][and that to many non-science types there isnt any difference ,but they persist in quoting them all as verified true sciences.

Equallly had science evolved its own cell [or even a cell membrane of its own construction or design]
or had even one had but one currently living intermediate 'evolution' been tested scientificlly and fully able to be replicated ; in creating the non god evolution theory ...
[not plaster casts of dead fossilised stone] ,...then science fact could have underpinned the 'theory' of evolution, with replicatable science fact not athiest hopes and theories [fears]

multiple fruitfly experiments have yet to produce a non fruit-fly ,it all points to genomic stasis

But here is the kicker if im wrong and i die im wrong but dead no opne to say i told you so
[but if we are right you have eternity knowing in your brief gift of life you couldnt see how amasing god's creation was
[and worse your surity in believing science theory over god creation convinced many ignorant fools to become athiests ,
allowing them to reject knowing the living loving god of mercy [for nothing but decieved fools unproven theory's]

[sure god will forgive you [but then you have to forgive yourself, that takes up eternity]

I believe that Roger Penrose has tried to develop a model of Phase Space before planck, it is speculative, that’s ok, but at least it is a try. Similarly, in the histographic literature relating to Jesus, there is some speculative modelling: the Quelle document and Thiering's Pesher. Both are forms of interpretations. The observations drawn would satisfy historians a tentative hypothesis but would not satisfy Christian theists.

I think you and I would like to see theists provide a conceptual model of god. I had to one for my PhD, which deals with quantifying [structural equation] abstract cultural axioms developed from scales: When one deals this influence of culture on knowledge discovery mathematically, it is transmuting from the abstract to concrete, where it is okay to be incomplete.

To be more credible, theists, I suggest, need to drop the "a priori" stance and build a tentative model of god, as an architectural form not descriptive form, such as "god is love".

I am not anti-religion. I am non-religious, because the evidence presented by the theists is inadequate to make substantive claims.

Col,

"It comes back to the big question - what created the "big bang" and what existed before it." - Col

At the instant of the Big Bang, a high energy state in-which 3-D space and time were bundled existed. Immediately, before the Big Bang a briging period of a minus to forty-third power of a second [Planck] is disunity hypothisised, to eminate from the singuluarity of phase-space [Penrose]:

It is a model strongly verifiable back to 300,000 years after the "Big Bang" and indicatively verifiable to Planck time. There are several models between singuality and Plank time: It is work in progess.

Hi Boazy, I believe the high feasibility of Cook and Bligh.If is possible to recover their bodies DNA tests could be perfermed, as with claims to the Family Romaninov.

Cheers all.