Maybe no way of knowing.

Have you recently renounced being a Christian and/or that the Christian God is the creator of everything except Himself.

If not, I'm just not interested in navel gazing positions that nobody actually holds.

I am still a Bible-believing Christian.

The last twenty or so posts in this thread has been about whether or not a creation requires a creator.

I am discussing this point as a matter of definitions and logic.

If you find this subtopic just so much "navel gazing", I doubt that anyone will be offended if you choose to stop participating in this particular discussion.

What a lazy and pathetic attempt to distract,lol. "Hey, let's quibble over definitions".

Failing to support your claim makes your claim irrelevant.

Therefore: there is no evidence for god except anecdotes from confused people.

Therefore: You have nothing else than "bla bla bla bla".

Scratch the word "maybe", and I'll agree with you.

You say that as if an infinite regress is a bad thing. Maybe the universe is infinitely old. But that would just meant the question "Why does anything exist at all?" isn't a valid question because it can't be answered and it can't be answered because there is no reason why anything at all exists--things, the universe, etc. exist, brutally, without a reason.

"Turtles all the way down."

Then allow me to do what you wouldn't - I'll replace every instance where I wrote the word 'God' with the word 'creator' (=three times total!).

Ok, here goes:


You have asserted that everything, except for the creator, is a creation.

When asked for your justification, you then asserted that creation (which would be everything that isn't the creator) requires a creator.

If every creation requires a creator is just a general comment, then it is true by definition, and also mundane. If it is a justification for the existence of a creator, which is what you had been asked, then it is arguing in a circle.

This is exactly what Comfort does, which is why I asked you what you thought of his argument. And because you made essentially the same argument, I'm giving you essentially the same response.

Do you think you've made a different argument to Comfort?

I could have used you a couple of days ago when the topic of discussion was Peano Arithmetic and the incompleteness theorem.

Exactly. Nothing incoherent with that so we know we're not violating the laws of logic positing an infinite regress. But an infinite regress does violate the Principle of Sufficient Reason and I suspect your adherence to that principle (or something to the effect) is what's leading to your seeming rejection of the infinite regress leg of your binary.

Please provide a link to Mr. Comfort's ACTUAL argument (in his own words) so I can answer your question.

"A building is proof of a builder. A painting is proof of a painter. Creation is proof of a creator". That's it. That's the whole argument. It assumes everything was created, because the creator (God) created everything. It's circular.

e.g. https://www.facebook.com/TBN/videos/1552251451478045/

I agree with that. Do you?

I agree with thst. Do you?

I agree with that. Do you?

No it doesn't assume that.

Thanks for the link.

If every creation requires a creator is just a general comment, then it is true by definition, and also mundane. If it is a justification for the existence of a creator, then it is arguing in a circle (much like our dialog, since this is at least the third time I've said this!).


How do you think my description of Comfort holding up random objects and declaring "this painting proves a painter" relates to every creation requires a creator?

1. Everything that exists was either a) created by something, or b) always existed.

2. Since (afaik) I have not ALWAYS existed, I am a created thing.

3. If I am a created thing, then I had a creator.

4. My creator was either a)itself created, or b) always existed.

etc...

Main Point: At least ONE THING in the universe was never created, since the created thing cannot precede the thing that created it.

Are you going to answer my questions?

And I will ask again, and keep asking, how do you know, or think you know, what that "one thing" is?

Is a painting / building / creation proof of a painter / builder / creator? Yes, I agree. As I said earlier for the statement creation is proof of a creator, it is true by definition - an analytic truth. By that, I mean painting / building / creation is the label given to what painters / builders / creators produce. Paintings / buildings / creations weren't things that existed independently of painters / builders / creators, that had to be matched up to determine what they actually were. Does that make sense?

Everything that exists either a) was created by something, or b) was not created by something.
Everything that exists either a) has always existed, or b) has not always existed.

You'd agree we can support these via the law of excluded middle, right?

So my first question would be to ask how you support your proposition? Sure, it might be true, but is it?

Plus, your language is loaded (perhaps not deliberately). Why not "caused by something" instead of "created by something"? Perhaps because it doesn't lead to your desired conclusion?

What do we mean by 'creation', exactly?

I could argue that since matter and energy cannot be created or destroyed (as far as we know), then nothing is ever actually created - all that happens is a rearrangement of what already exists.

This is a pretty bold position to take, though, and it's probably not what people typically mean - when we say that a creator creates in the same sense as a painter paints and a builder builds. We are just describing this rearrangement of what already exists.

This leads me to my next criticism: the kind of creation that it sounds like you are talking about is in fact the bringing matter and energy into existence kind of creation, not the rearrangement of what already exists kind of creation that we attribute to human agent creators. An equivocation.

If by creator you mean liken to a human agent (in the same way as the painter / builder / creator labels), this does not follow from your proposition ("created by something"). Also is the issue about using loaded language (compare to "caused by something" / "I had a cause").

e.g. Does a diamond formed under pressure and time have a creator in that sense? You won't get pushback if you just left it as it has a cause.

See my response to 1.

Postulating the existence of an unmoved mover is the only reasonable explanation (satisfies PSR) for why anything exists at all. The only other options of always existing or spontaneously popping into existence are not reasonable explanations but mere statements of facts.

Of what? What exactly is the unmoved mover?

Yeah, statements of fact suck, right?

I don't think any of them have explanatory power, tbh, but I'm open to being convinced. What has been explained by postulating an unmoved mover?

"why anything exists at all."

Why does an unmoved mover exist and how is he the explanation for why anything exists at all?

Idk, it just does.
Idk, he just is.

Point being that when people ask explanation seeking 'why' questions, they're not looking for a brute fact response because such a response really isn't an answer to the question. Same goes when asking "Why anything exists at all?" Answering with a factual statement like "It just does" or "It always has" isn't the sort of answer the question is looking for.

Anyway and to be clear, I'm not arguing for the existence of an unmoved mover. What I'm arguing is that if we think the question (Why does anything exist at all?) is valid and if we think the PSR applies to existence itself, the existence of an unmoved mover is the only acceptable answer since the other responses are no more valid to the sort of question being asked than my initial response to your questions.