Benevolent Creator God?

[R00tKiT]

Why do I get caught up in these huge replies that need me to set aside some time to type up?

From now on, and to make replying easier, I suggest we adopt a different format, we will focus on one particular point until it's settled, then move on to another. In any case, it seems you have huge problem with the fact that Muhammad conducted wars; so let's focus on that and on God's benevolence for now.

Benevolent god provides message to Muhammad, apparently, in a continuous fashion for years.
Muhammad gets transformed from an illiterate merchant into a " social reformer, statesman", and military leader who eventually conquers the whole Arabian Peninsula.
Obviously, Arabia was taken by the power of illiterate merchant's diplomacy, not military might, right?
So, what is it, benevolent or military? You can't have it both ways.

Okay. So, first of all, it's not clear what's your stance on Muhammad is to begin with, do you think he should've adopted some Gandhi-like opposition? That he was wrong about resorting to force ?

Aside from that, I strongly recommend you to actually read (even just some excerpts of) his biography, especially the part after his migration to Medina, that of Montgomery Watt is particularly well-written and covers many aspects of his life. Again, whether you're a Muslim or not, we're talking about one of the most documented people -or probably THE most documented person - in the history of mankind, your simplistic assessment above is nothing more than the demonstrably wrong platitude "since Muhammad fought wars, these wars must have been about imposing Islam on people".

If you are assuming God's benevolence, then you have the additional theological question of why God would let Muhammad be the successful messenger that he was? I know this is not an issue for an atheist, but if you assume God's existence with some desirable properties, then it really should be taken into account. And, actually, God's benevolence is an important premise in any argument in favor of Muhammad's prophethood. Even the most hardened apologist can't get very far with a malevolent God.

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@Klorophyll I'm not going to do a point for point on your last post because most of it is basically working under the grand assumption that god exists and is responsible for everything.  

And I gave the reasons why this assumption might very probably be true. There are valid arguments out there establishing the existence of a first cause. Once this preliminary result is settled, we assess whether this first cause has some properties, which we infer from its effects (the universe). 

From my experience with these discussions, non-believers just keep playing around and throwing charges of "special pleading" or "infinity is not well understood" left and right to escape the unavoidable necessity of a first cause. Even well known atheist debaters like M. Dillahunty start complaining about how difficult infinity is to dodge the arguments, whereas establishing a first cause is really straightforward.

as far as the universe is concerned it is not a miracle; it's very explainable within the laws of the universe. 

The universe's existence per se can't be explained by natural science, so you would call it a miracle? Laws of the universe only describe its inner workings... but I suspect you already know that...?

.  That's fine as a belief system but its also teleology, its circular, and it is not any sort of proof of god's existence, nor is it a convincing logical argument.  I would bet every atheist on this forum is extremely familiar with this approach and every one of them have probably considered this concept very carefully and eventually rejected it.  

Argument from authority, I frankly don't care about how much some atheist is familiar with the teleological argument. If their reasons for rejecting it are not good enough, then they have an epistamically flawed position. 

Regarding Einstein's theory of special relativity.  Look, I probably know much more than you do about the subject so stop assuming things.  My point is that Einstein developed his thought experiments without any mathematics or science.  Those things came later.  His ideas are what led to the discoveries and his ideas constitute his profound insight into the field.  The math and science were merely the structure those ideas needed to convince other scientists.  It should be extremely impressive to you that it took decades of technological advancement to be able to confirm some of his ideas with physical measurements.  This is often the case in major scientific breakthroughs.  In my opinion, this is the closest thing that humans get to a miracle.

We all know this, dude. You said Einstein didn't rely on electromagnetism and classical mechanics, when, in fact, and, OBVIOUSLY, he did, which is something you can guess by just reading the damn title of his original paper on SR. That's the only thing I was responding to, nobody here is denying that his insights led to major discoveries.