(November 4, 2014 at 12:19 pm)Esquilax Wrote: Chad's prime mover- which I just don't understand because I don't agree with it!- doesn't just start the universe in cases where the universe is finite, but sustains it, seemingly by magic, in cases where it is eternal. It's still having his cake and eating it too, since he doesn't seem particularly interested in demonstrating either of those things and, tellingly, has accepted this claim despite at least half of it being completely, unavoidably fictional depending on the eventual status of the universe and its origins, but at least its as consistent as a random, baseless magic claim can be.
Well, there's one more reason to distrust philosophy.

Quote:Because magic, that's why. It's not meant to be considered that deeply, at heart it's just a cheap rhetorical trick; it's the thing that does the thing that confirms Chad's beliefs via solving a problem we have no indication exists beyond the fact that he really wants it to.
I do think that much of the "reasoning" cited by the more educated faithful -- the ontological argument is a prime example -- is sad insofar as it is an attempt to define a god into existence ... as if reality bows to words.