A) The central flaw with the First Cause Argument is now, was, and ever shall be, the simple question: Who created God? The argument that all things must be created requires infinite regression. Stopping when you get to God in the regression is a violation of the argument.

I've said it before, and will say it again: the concept of God provides no answers, it simply denies that there are any questions.

B) The most fundamental difference between a believer and an unbeliever is the ability to say "I don't know." The honest man says "I don't know;" the other says, "I know: God." You may not know how the newspaper got on your doorstep, but that doesn't mean God put it there. It's just ignorance of the facts. There is no shame in simple ignorance, but there is in willful ignorance (and in assuming everyone else shares this ignorance). Some things are at present, and perhaps eternally, unknowable. But it's certain that if you assume there's no answer, i.e., that God is responsible, you'll never learn or accomplish anything. In the 19th century people commonly died of sepsis. Why? Either because God wanted it that way, or because doctors didn't wash their hands before surgery. Ask Ignaz Semmelweis which turned out to be the right answer.

C) As for your final statement, I reply: If you can't refute Zeus, why should you call yourself a Jew?

If you say that what isn't space time or matter isn't God, and saying that you don't know instead, aren't you simply refusing to use an accepted definition?

So "I don't know" = God.

I can understand why you might, due to the associated baggage.

BTW I agree that i think of deists as atheists.

Quote:What is not composed of space time and matter is not natural. Therefore if it's not natural it's supernatural.

Now all you have to do is produce evidence that this "what" exists. We'll wait.

But don't take too long. I'm already 63.

*presents Min with the problem of nothing to something*

(May 9, 2013 at 12:20 am)xdrgnh Wrote: How can technology detect something that is not time space or matter if that is all that exists in the universe?

That's the issue, isn't it? We don't have all the answers, except for those who have answers that they cannot corroborate because the evidence cannot possibly be detected. The ancient people who believed that the universe was carved out of the carcass of a dragon slain by a god have exactly as much proof of their assertion as the person who thinks it was all assembled from nothing by an "intelligent designer."

If that's the case --if the universe was created by a being we cannot detect and who deliberately hides from us-- then I don't see the use in trying to find him; it would seem as if he wanted us to just enjoy the universe and stop bugging him.

Technology can never detect something that is not composed of space time and matter because technology can only be composed of space time and matter. Zeus can be refuted because the greek myth's make physical claims not meta physical claims and physical claims can be refuted with science. I'm using pure logic and reason. No matter how advanced or knowledgeable we became a species we will not be able to make a square circle. the same thing applies with doing a scientific experiment to show the validity of the super natural AKA stuff that is not time space or matter. However from the logical principles I expressed in the beginning of this thread it can be shown that something besides space time and matter must exist for our universe to have come into being. If you want to ask why the first cause came into being then you get a infinite regression. It's not a good argument against the first cause asking the cause of the first cause. G-d is defined in my religion and most religion and in Deism as a being which is not composed of space time or matter. The big difference between a Deist and a Atheist to me is that a Atheist have to be believe all that exists is nature while a Deist has to believe that something besides nature exists.

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(May 9, 2013 at 1:02 am)Baalzebutt Wrote: If one cannot refute pink unicorns, one should not say they don't exist.

How is this statement any different than your statement about deism?

Pink unicorns have no logical reason to exist. As I shown in the beginning of this thread a first cause AKA Deist G-d must exist via logical necessity for our universe to exist.

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(May 9, 2013 at 1:17 am)Ryantology Wrote:

Quote:Intrinsically the universe alone does not have the sufficient characteristic to come into existence on it's own.

But, conscious intelligence required for there to be a designer does? If so, explain how you can know it.

A first cause is not a designer. It could of been a designer but we would have no prove that. But we can prove there must be some immaterial cause which is not composed of space time or matter and we call this immaterial cause G-d.

I see no reason to attach the title 'God' to anything less than an intelligent designer.

(May 8, 2013 at 8:43 pm)xdrgnh Wrote: If you cannot refute Deism...

There's no need to refute a claim for which there is no evidence.

(May 8, 2013 at 8:43 pm)xdrgnh Wrote: ...then I don't see why one should call themselves an Atheist.

I use the label 'atheist' to identify the fact that I have no belief in theistic propositions, that's all. No accurate inference for the reason for my lack of belief can be made from the label.

(May 9, 2013 at 12:15 pm)Ryantology Wrote: I see no reason to attach the title 'God' to anything less than an intelligent designer.

How G-d or even the Theist G-d have intelligence if intelligence is something that is characteristic of living organism which are carbon based and are made out of space time and matter where G-d is neither of those. G-d has no intelligence. A Deistic view of G-d and creation would not even require a designer of the universe just a creator. The universe could of been made without a plan and done in a random way. But the existence of the universe would still need a first cause who is not a material being because material cannot create other material from nothing.

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(May 9, 2013 at 12:17 pm)Ben Davis Wrote:

(May 8, 2013 at 8:43 pm)xdrgnh Wrote: If you cannot refute Deism...

There's no need to refute a claim for which there is no evidence.

(May 8, 2013 at 8:43 pm)xdrgnh Wrote: ...then I don't see why one should call themselves an Atheist.

I use the label 'atheist' to identify the fact that I have no belief in theistic propositions, that's all. No inference for the reason for my lack of belief can be inferred from the label.

This generation of Atheist is to reliant on science for truth. Science can disprove not prove.You can prove Deism as I have shown using logic and reason. Are you saying logic and reason is not good enough for a proof? Even mathematics uses logic and reason to prove and not evidence.

(May 8, 2013 at 9:17 pm)ChadWooters Wrote:

(May 8, 2013 at 9:07 pm)Rayaan Wrote: ... or energy.

...or thought and sensation.

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I predict that someone will say the universe always existed, which is irrelevant to a cosmological argument, but they'll trot it out anyway.

Thought and sensations are not different things they are just manifestations of energy and matter.

You can see thoughts and measure sensations.

They are fully part of the normal physical world.