Sam Harris

Hello everyone,
                    I’m writing a book that’s a mix of zen, psychotherapuetic ideas and moral philosophy and i want to include an imaginary dialogue between a Christian, Muslim and an Atheist(An unlikely scenario I realise, it’s a thought experiment) about what each person understands the idea “God is love” to mean for them. I want to get some real world opinions and not just blindly assume I know what people from these perspectives would say. Thank you very much for your help and support,

                                                    Chris.

Not sure why you think such a scenario is unlikely.  It all depends where you are.  Here where I live (in NYC) you could probably go to a public square on any given day and witness such a conversation yourself

Here is my opionion on the (now very tedious) idea that “God is love”.  Why?  Why give love another word?  We already know love.  Why introduce all this God baggage to the thing?

Would it make sense if I said “Unicorns are love”?  Even though unicorns might be loving creatures, it makes no sense to equate them with what we mean by “love”.

Not sure why you think such a scenario is unlikely.  It all depends where you are.  Here where I live (in NYC) you could probably go to a public square on any given day and witness such a conversation yourself

Here is my opionion on the (now very tedious) idea that “God is love”.  Why?  Why give love another word?  We already know love.  Why introduce all this God baggage to the thing?

Would it make sense if I said “Unicorns are love”?  Even though unicorns might be loving creatures, it makes no sense to equate them with what we mean by “love”.

Yes this is more or less what most athiests say. Thanks very much.

To clarify, I’ve heard theists say the same.