Ellis, further to your question about God and science:
I told you about my god-hypothesis as being BEYOND and within EXISTENCE
G.O.D., on the other hand is a complex and not a simple idea, but something else, something unimaginable. G.O.D. is definitely NOT a dimensional being like the gods and God are imagined to be. G.O.D. is an aseity--a very special and complex concept.
To the above, I add as follows: Read, carefully, what Paul says about THEOS (the Greek for god, generally speaking) in Acts 17:22-34. Here he offers to explain THEOS as the ONE who is not an idol--physically or mentally created.I apologize for the long quote from the Bible. I do it to show that Paul's concept of "god" was pretty advanced for the time in which he lived.
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Acts 17:22-34
New International Version (NIV)
22 Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: “People of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious.[One translation mentions: "And you worship a lot of gods.]
23 For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship—and this is what I am going to proclaim to you.
24 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands.
25 And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else.
26 From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands.
27 God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us.
28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’[a] As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’[b]
29 “Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by human design and skill.
30 In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.
31 For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.”
32 When they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some of them sneered, but others said, “We want to hear you again on this subject.”
33 At that, Paul left the Council.
34 Some of the people became followers of Paul and believed. Among them was Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus, also a woman named Damaris, and a number of others.
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Paul, the Jewish follower of Jesus--showing how open-minded he was--even quoted Gentile philosophers of whom he knew:
Footnotes:
Acts 17:28 From the Cretan philosopher Epimenides
Acts 17:28 From the Cilician Stoic philosopher Aratus
