If the "reductio ad absurdum" lives in your house, eats your food and sleeps in your bed then asking the question is meaningless for you've already got a roommate.

If the "uncaused cause" likewise is your roommate then you've got your answer.

So , what are you having for breakfast?

This is just not true. Even if this were a legitimate question (which I contend it is not) we do not have to have an explanation A to recognize that explanation A is the best explanation. If you needed an explanation for every explanation then you would get caught in an infinite regress in all areas of science and science would then become worthless.

If you were talking about a finite created God, then it would be a fair question. But no one is talking about such a God.

We know that the universe has not eternally been in the same state that it is in now.

Then accept that "we do not know" is a perfectly legitimate answer to dispel any notion that the first mover argument should prove god in any way.

Logic goes both ways, it is not a one way street. You don't get to invent unknowable properties to prove your case.

The first mover argument is pure intellectual nonsense.

God is the author of life, ALL things originated with Him, He is ONE God, alone without companion. Without beginning and without end, eternal.

The real question is: Why are you asking?

Would you know the truth if it was told to you?

How would you know the the truth if you heard it?

Pletho

Well you misstated what I said.

All you posted above is the way you want things to be not the way they are.

Everyone reasons and I actually think I'm above average in intelligence its just I have an intelligence not typical of the average poster on this board. (Most intelligent people know there are different types of intelligence.)

But with a Christian its hard to determine what part is reason and what part is revelation because our intellects are the conduits.

I simply prefer revelation. I think its the better part. The Godly or holy part and a lot less dysfunctional then the human intellect. (If you doubt the dysfunctional part then why does every person on this board reason to a different conclusion?...I like relying on God. His intellect is superior to man's.)

Don't bother to respond. I've had enough arrogance and mockery for the day.

I dont know Gods nature if there is one. So i dont know if he always was or if he was created or if he spontaneously emerged form nothing.
How do you know God has always been in the same state ?

Got to get in on this. the implication is that "logic" proves the truth or falsity of a statement but this isn't so.

"Logic" is the bringing forth of "forms" which through reason can be connected and understood by others even if they were unable to be the "first explorer" of the 'form".

In our case the 'uncaused cause" is certainly a 'form" from which a thinker can bring to you and therefore act logically. If one does not appreciate the "form" then waiting is the best policy.

Now it goes without saying (but I'll say it) that the rascal Hume denied causality and likened it to something like "custom", when I first read Hume it seemed like a realization of "contiguity" but I think that was an error on my part. Hell, even the scientist Metric doesn't believe in causality.

Back to the reducio/uncaused thing, the intellect can speak to these things and are provable intellectually but at the present time are not(at least to the ordinary man) experiential. The difference between "experience" and "intellectuality" should be noted.

I can "experience" a cart wheel and have knowledge of that very same act. Another may not ever do a cart wheel and write a book on the same. Intellectuality or logic in its present state( in the future it will) cannot bring one to higher knowledge in 'experience" but can certainly lead one logically and intellectually to that very same nature.

It's no different than a mathematical presentation of 4,5, or 6 dimensions. You can present this to your fellow mathematicians or to Metric himself as an intellectual matter through the appreciation of "forms" but you will not have "experienced" the 4th, 5th or 6th dimensions.

It is not about inventing anything. The evidence either points to the need for a designer or it does not. You obviously believe that it does not, and I believe that it does.

We get the description of the designer based on the evidence.

And "we do not know" imo is not an acceptable answer based on the evidence.

this is the question that made me start questioning things...im pretty sure i was on the toilet one day and started asking myself "who decided that god got to be god?" i was maybe 15 or 16...true story...

doesn't really say whether or not its a legit question...because the legitimacy of this question is gonna depend on who you ask it to...

I'm not trying to convert you. Faith is faith. I'm just glad to finally hear someone admit that they start from a fixed point of believing in Jesus and work everything else around that. I find such honesty admirable.

I do not find your logic admirable, but why should you care about that? I think faith is fine as long as you admit that this faith will sometimes lead you to believe things in the face of contradictory facts. At least you recognize this. You sell yourself short by demeaning the IQ you were born with. I find this much more intellectually honest than someone who tries to defend their position by pretending to be intellectually logical.

What I would like to convert you to is someone who is willing to use logic to better define their beliefs. Someone who cares more about what's true than what comforts them or what they hope for. I doubt I'll have much luck, but at least I know where you're coming from.

btw- I understand faith, because I had faith for the first 19 years of my life. I know what it's like to believe in Jesus without question even when something doesn't jive.

But these aren't the only two options. Most would agree (I certainly do), that life has the appearance of design. The question is what is the designer?

A snowflake, a canyon, a rain forest, and life, all appear designed. Do these things require a god as the designer? I don't think so, but you do. We both agree that there IS a designer, however. I say there are other ways these things could have been designed. If you were willing to look at the evidence, I'm sure you'd have to agree with this. You really don't think god individually designs each and every snowflake do you? You ARE willing to acknowledge there is a process that can cause a snowfake to crystalize without god's intervention, right?

Nobody is trying to "convert" you to atheism. Nobody in their right mind would think that it is possible to do so when dealing with someone as fixed in her beliefs as you are. Logic and reason are completely lost on you. You see people using logic and reason with you as being personal attacks.

Keep drinking the kool-aid. Nobody is going to try to take it away from you.

I don't really disagree with anything here. I just don't see that there is sufficient evidence that the universe and all life could be like this without a personal agent. I have looked at evidence for a purely natural existence and find it insufficient.

I am not saying that it is absurd for anyone to look at the evidence and conclude that there is no creator. I am saying that asking "who designed the designer" is absurd and does nothing to undercut the necessity for a designer.

And what "evidence" you believe that you have seen that I have not considered?

Most atheists have NOT reached the conclusion that there is no god. The conclusion they've reached is that there is insufficient reason to think that there is. This is the most often repeated misconception by theists. I wish you people would understand this already. It's important.

Under what premise do you feel the universe requires a designer, but god does not? If you have a satisfactory explanation for why god doesn't need a maker, while everything else does, then you have some kind of a point. Otherwise, there's no reason to logically conclude that god is exempt from what you find necessary for everything else.

While it's entirely possible that we have looked at much of the same evidence only to reach different conclusions, I think it's more likely that either I have looked at more evidence, or.... At the very least, I have looked at the same evidence from a more objective viewpoint. It's hard to be objective about evidence when you start with a pre-formed conclusion.

just felt this needed to be addressed, IQ is not set at birth, it is designed as a property to find learning disabled kids and can be improved upon. don't make excuses like that. learning isn't a matter of intelligence, it is a matter if caring enough about the truth to put the effort in to find it. you are perfectly capable of understanding a logical argument. there is absolutely no reason to believe that intelligence is a purely genetic trait which is what you imply by saying it is set at birth.

You blowing that statement WAY out of proportion. I was trying to get a simple point across and it did not have to do with whether or not people believed their is no God or have no belief in God or have to reason to believe, or any other variation. I wish atheists on this board would stop being so touchy.

Statements like this really piss me off. What makes you think that you are right and you are being more objective than me? You believe that came to the "right" conclusion. That is fine. But then you take it one step further and say that you must be right, and the only reason that I have arrived at a different conclusion is because I did something wrong or did not look at enough evidence.

I am sure that you did not mean it in such a strict sense, but I hear this way too often.

And your last statement really gets me. How is it that I started with a pre-formed conclusion, and you did not? Couldn't I say the exact same thing about you? Everyone looks at the evidence with their worldview assumptions, some more than others, but for you to say that because I am a theist I am bias and you are not is dishonest.

If the Bible was created for Man and the "god of the Bible" is the "god of the universe" then I would assume the universe would be what Man understands it to be. And as far as I'm concerned the universe is everything.

-

As for who created The Creator I think the approach is wrong. Instead of looking at The Creator as a separate entity I think we should look at him (it) as a whole. And there are many parts that make up this whole. If there is One definite reason for everything, then that reason would have to be a part of everything. So in a sense God has created himself.

Look at the first two sentences in the Bible: Genesis 1:1-2 says, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.

This says that the "Spirit" of God was moving over the surface of the waters but it does not mean that the surface of the waters (and the water itself) wasn't God too. We know that a part of God is a Spirit because the Bible says so right in the second sentence. If God was only Spirit it wouldn't need to point out that the "Spirit" was there. I look at the "Spirit" as the intelligence of God.

When you think about Creation you have to think that "the thought" of Creation came first. Before earth, was a "shapeless chaotic mass" that was God. God was "the mass" but God was also the intelligence that put the matter together that formed earth as we know it. And for the remainder of this life God will continue to expand and Create until the end.

As easy as God was, "The Big Bang", the end could look something like this:

Right. The whole argument is based on the impossibility of infinity, but then proposes an infinite being as the answer.

...and we're not supposed to question this!

Seriously, think about it. SOMETHING needs to be infinite SOMEWHERE. Whether it's the universe, time, God, space aliens, or whatever, the same infinity (that doesn't make sense to us) is at some point responsible for explaining things. Your "God" solution isn't objectively more special than the others no matter how much it asserts itself to be.

Except for one MAJOR point you're overlooking:

There are many more indoctrinated theists that later become atheists than there are indoctrinated atheists that later become theists.

If worldviews were so responsible for biases about the information you're contesting in Lestat's post, how come so many more people "break free" into atheism than the other way around? (I don't think the evidence points where you think it does )

In America you might be right. But how many of these people "break free" for logical reasons? How many of these people have actually looked at the evidence and been able to understand the evidence and then turned to atheism?

I would wager that the number one reason that people turn from theism to atheism is that they do not like the concept of God that they have been taught.

I turned to atheism because I saw no compelling reason to believe in the existence of a god.

You believe in an invisible supernatural being who sent his "son" to be tortured and killed by humanity, only to shortly thereafter become a Jewish zombie who prowled the earth before eventually floating into the clouds. Your "evidence" for this supernatural being (and his zombie son) is a book written 2000 years ago by bronze age desert dwellers.

Yeah, how can we possibly think you're not being objective in your beliefs?

Second, was raised Jewish, family was religious and then I just started to think and couldnt see a reason to believe in god.

Beats the alternative of changing the concept around until you DO like it.