Detecting design or intent in nature

[Jenny A]

Certainly I know love. I love and am loved and I see others love and be loved. But that has nothing to do with whether there is a god.

Oops, sorry, maybe you idea of God is different then mine

I've never seen anyone provide any real evidence of a god of any sort. You want to prove yours? You should start by defining him. You theists have a number of different definitions. Usually the definition of a god you attempt to prove is much more abstract and limited than the god you believe though.

Do you know what 'first cause' means? And do you also know that it ends with 'second cause'?

Oh and yes I know about the first cause argument. It's a very old argument going back to the ancient Greeks who formulated it this way:

1. Every finite and contingent being has a cause.
2. A causal loop cannot exist.
3. A causal chain cannot be of infinite length.
4. Therefore, something that is not an effect must exist.

Thomas Aquinas is traditionally given Christian credit for it. He formulates it this way:

1. A contingent (unnecessary cosmologically speaking) being exists.
2. Every contingent being has a cause of its existence.
3. The cause of its existence must be something other than itself.
4. What causes a contingent being to exist must be either only contingent beings or at least one necessary being.
5. Contingent beings cannot cause this contingent being to exist.
6. Therefore, what causes this contingent beings to exist must contain at least one necessary being.
7. Therefore, a necessary being exists.

My biggest object to such such arguments is that they are special pleading. They assume that everything requires a cause, but then magically release god from that requirement.

Immanuel Kant rejected the idea because "causality cannot legitimately be applied beyond the realm of possible experience to a transcendent cause." In other words Kant rejected the necessity of causation as a premise.