The key to understanding anything spiritual is allowing yourself to be open-minded about the possibility of the supernatural, not just fighting it because you don't like the implications.
I agree; but, as already said, that does not mean that one should be endlessly credulous and accept matters, especially of great import, without compelling evidence or proof. Or, given then the supposed deity gave us intellect and intelligence, one should be allowed to exercise them and make an informed choice. I notice you have now, rather tellingly entirely diverted from this, quite reasonable, epistemological expectation into whole new fields of discussion. Which is great, but we are still left with no arms and legs growing back at Lourdes.
What you call "special pleading" doesn't apply, because the definition of that term requires leaving out a proper justification.
Special pleading: Applying standards, principles, and/or rules to other people or circumstances, while making oneself or certain circumstances exempt from the same critical criteria, without providing adequate justification. Special pleading is often a result of strong emotional beliefs that interfere with reason. You are giving your deity presumed special status and powers and then allowing these to exempt Him from logical or moral objections; or arguing that, because we cannot understand Him, then this claimed ignorance none the less allows an avoidance of, or explains away, obvious questions of contradiction.
Special pleading can also arise when one uses unproven suppositions to explain things, as you now do:
time, space, and matter all came into existence at the same exact moment. My point is that without time, there would be no when to set up space or matter. Without space, you'd have a when and what, but no specific location. And without matter, there would be nothing that existed for the purpose of time and space working together... Nature never creates itself from a total void,
There is no 'law' why, if we accept the principle something permanent can exist, which given enough tries can provoke things more, but which is wholly natural. (Most of Aquinas' famous Proofs of a necessary Cause can apply equally to something natural.) Science does not say that a true 'nothing' ever 'existed' (itself a logical contradiction). That there was always something with, quite evidently, a potential for more.
Also your words are ironic, since I have been assured by some believers that, their alleged deity is alive and well while, as it turns out, er, 'outside of time and space'. How's that work then, given what you have just claimed? Special pleading will be noted.
in order to form anything as huge and varied as the cosmos, the cause behind it had to be more powerful than nature itself.
This is not a law either. An acorn is not so mighty and impressive as an oak, which also has greater potential to create.
There also had to be intelligence involved, because we know from various fields of study that the universe is too organized and detailed to be random.
This is not true. None of the physical sciences, assert intelligent design, er. Creationism as the cause of anything. That things 'look so complicated that they must have a designer' is just credulity (even though it eventually convinced Flew, interestingly), while such things as 'irreducible complexity' have been demolished or found wanting. (e.g. in the Dover Trial). Scientists, btw typically have the lowest belief in God who major in physics and astronomy.
because making anything requires a deliberate decision.
Again untrue. Does a seed germinating require deliberation? Or a star forming?
So when you consider the notion of a timeless, space less, immaterial, powerful, intelligent, and personal being...what's the first idea that pops into your head? There's a reason many apologists refer to God as the "uncaused first cause", because rationally it makes perfect sense.
It certainly makes sense to some; for others it is pure metaphysical speculation and without evidence. And, as you yourself say at the start last time, how can anything be said to 'exist' at all, without spatiality and temporality? In terms of intelligence, we might also ask how could a supremely intelligent and perfect being design things sub-optimally? Like the aforementioned natural evil, whether catastrophes or disasters, boasted of in Isiah, for instance. In biology, any engineer worth his salt could improve on the 'design' of the human body (the construction of the human knee for instance, or making the same tube serve for breathing and eating, say, or the creating of redundant organs etc).
I agree though that science does not hold all the answers. But then it doesn't claim to.
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Moviefan2k4 (23)
2 months ago
First, I feel it necessary to fall back on my previous refrain: "I can give you evidence, but I can't force you to accept it." From all you've written so far, it seems to me you are purposely holding to materialism, which rejects the supernatural without question. If you keep that ideological defense up, nothing anyone says will get through to you. Now, I will attempt to tackle the number of your recent objections, as far as I am able...
1) Assigning human traits to a supernatural Creator does not involve "special pleading" from a Christian standpoint, because Scripture says humanity was made in His image. So this begs the question of, "What kind of God says "trust Me", but then makes Himself so hard to understand that we can't?"
2) Your implied assertion that anything happens given enough chance doesn't make much sense when you examine it closely. One counter-example often used is the idea of taking apart a wristwatch, putting all the pieces in a bag, shaking it for a million years, and expecting to remove a watch that's ticking and on time. Another has you walking on the beach, and you see "John loves Mary" carved into the sand, but you're alone. You know a mind made that, even if you didn't witness it. The same things apply to Creation itself; you don't have to experience everything to accept that its true.
3) The "acorn and oak" example isn't about actual creation, because plants have no inherent consciousness. They're more like computer programs, which need a programmer greater than them to start things running. Plants are basically a rejuvenating food source made to produce after their own kinds; they have no inborn life.
4) No one has ever actually seen a star form. We see them die all the time, but the notion that they were formed from gravity and space dust comes from agnostic Harlow Shapley, and dedicated naturalist Carl Sagan who popularized it later.
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filmflaneur (1084)
2 months ago
I can give you evidence, but I can't force you to accept it.
Indeed you can't; but, if you remember, I was not asking to be be coerced whether by you, or any supposed deity just persuaded after making an informed decision. It has to be said though that the evidence so far presented has been largely based on false assertions and the claims of credulity, with a touch of scripture.
you are purposely holding to materialism, which rejects the supernatural without question.
It is possible here that you mean
naturalism, a theory denying that an event or object has a supernatural significance. specifically : the doctrine that scientific laws are adequate to account for all phenomena. One advantage of this philosophy,
pace Occam is that is does not require a whole new level of reality to explain things.
Materialism, in philosophy, just posits that reality is entirely composed of matter - such as when considering a god supposedly 'outside of time and space' (a form of being you earlier also dismissed, one notes)
Having said that to be more precise it is more that I am questioning the supernatural until I am persuaded otherwise, which is perfectly reasonable. Hence that interest in legs growing back at Lourdes. Any news on that?
Assigning human traits to a supernatural Creator does not involve "special pleading" from a Christian standpoint, because Scripture says humanity was made in His image.
It can also be seen as a prominent example of an Anthropomorphic Fallacy, also known as the pathetic fallacy : a common fallacy that occurs when someone attributes human characteristics to things that do not have them. What has happened anthropologically speaking, is that man has projected himself out into the previously unknown and scary to story things in terms he can relate to.
So this begs the question of, "What kind of God says "trust Me", but then makes Himself so hard to understand that we can't?"
It is not that the idea of God is hard to understand (it is a notion common is every culture we can think of and has been forever). It is the god which makes it hard to accept his existence through a lack of evidence when he would supposedly know exactly what it needs to bring over many more doubters.
One counter-example often used is the idea of taking apart a wristwatch, putting all the pieces in a bag, shaking it for a million years, and expecting to remove a watch that's ticking and on time
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watchmaker_analogy#:~:text=It%20argued%20that%20when%20the,observe%20today%20without%20the%20need
The various strong counters to this old argument dating back to Paley can be found easily, as in the above link. Can one really not tell the difference between what is natural and the artificial? Or be so unaware of the slow processes of evolution, widely proved and investigated, as to not recognise the way natural things slowly change over time? Also the Watchmaker argument is unfalsifiable, so its not even a scientific one.
No one has ever actually seen a star form.
Incorrect. Astronomers have witnessed the formation of stars, EG L1448-IRS2E: located in the Perseus star-forming region of the Milky Way, this object is in the earliest stages of star formation. It's pulling in matter from a surrounding envelope of gas and dust, and is ejecting streams of high-velocity gas from its center. (A moment of creation, btw, achieved without intelligence or deliberation.) Google is your friend.
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