(November 21, 2018 at 5:27 am)ignoramus Wrote: B, you'll understand my biggest gripe is when I'm told God (whatever it is, I'm ignostic) lives outside our universe.
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Yeah, that's frustrating.
Like a lot of the wimpier arguments, I think this is a trickle-down version of something they've heard and imperfectly understood. For one, "lives" would be tricky -- God doesn't live as an animal lives. Also "outside" gives the impression that God has a house somewhere out past the city limits, where the city is the universe. They would do better to say that because it is immaterial, God is not a part or portion of the universe, but at the same time is not separate from it. Since to say "God and the universe are One" is misleading, probably better to say "God and the universe do not make two," or, even better, to use the Buddhist term 不二 -- "not two."
Quote:why do most cartoon theists even need to justify the existence of their God using empirical evidence? Are they trying to convince themselves or us? My take is their still struggling with their own mental gymnastics.
I think it's the unwitting compliment they pay to science. They realize, quite rightly, that empirical evidence is how we understand and prove things in this day and age. So they foolishly try to use it where it isn't applicable. There is something to be said for "natural theology," working to discuss God without knowledge given through revelation, but it works through logical extrapolation from obvious truths, not through empirical evidence of the type they want.
