The Problem with Christians

[robvalue]

If Jesus has wanted me to eat broccoli, he wouldn't have made it taste like piss weasels!

[Cyberman]

How do you know this?

Looking at the complexity of living systems and determining that the chances that these things evolved from random chemicals is infinitely less than there being a super intelligence that designed it all.

No, I'm not going to let you switch tracks on me. You wasn't talking about complexity of living systems or random chemicals - you made three specific assertions, viz:

When God created the universe, he created the dimension of time. He is not subject to age in the way we measure it because he is outside of time. Therefore it is not necessary that God has a creator - he is eternal.

and I want to know how you know this. Don't play Dolphinetics with me - I invented the term.

[robvalue]

I seem to remember some skunk monkey did a video about all this "outside of space and time" malarkey recently. That's right, malarkey. Look it up.

http://youtu.be/baoHEPkixhQ

[LadyForCamus]

I seem to remember some skunk monkey did a video about all this "outside of space and time" malarkey recently. That's right, malarkey. Look it up.

http://youtu.be/baoHEPkixhQ

Not to mention the fact that if we grant that god does exist within his own set of time and space, then we are going backwards into infinite regress again - who created god's time; god's reality; yada yada...

[robvalue]

Good point! We are indeed.

He's a non-answer. He's replacing a question mark with a meaningless three letter word, which no one is allowed to ask about.

Once we've established anything at all about this God bastard, we have exactly all the same questions as before. Luckily for theists nothing ever gets established. It's like waiting for tomorrow. By the time it's tomorrow, it's today again.

[Crossless2.0]

athrock, I must have missed the part where you made a compelling case that a singularity is 'nothing' or where you demonstrated that there was 'nothing' "prior" to the Big Bang (leaving aside the improper use of causal language to characterize what a universe "pre" space/time might be like). For that matter, I must have missed the post in which you provided "an entirely new suite of terminology" (to borrow from Esquilax) to describe the physics of a pre-Big Bang world.

Ah, then you posit that a singularity is the "something" from which everything came. Setting aside the fact the singularity CHANGED from one moment to the next for reasons completely unknown (and requiring a cause), are you then of the opinion that this singularity was in existence from all eternity with no beginning in a finite past?

Your insistence on using words like "nothing" and "cause" when trying to discuss what, if anything, was 'before' the Big Bang seems to amount to one continuous misapplication of terms that make sense in the world as described by our current models of physics but may not be applicable to what is being discussed. We really don't know. And you're putting the cart before the horse.

Can we know? From science alone?

I don't have an opinion whether the "singularity was in existence from all eternity". Why the hell would I? Given the current state of our knowledge, the people actually qualified to discuss such questions must resort to speculation, so it would be asinine of me to trumpet an opinion about something we don't (and possibly can't) know -- whether through legitimate means like science or through imaginary sources of knowledge like "revelation".

What is "God" if not a conceptual Band-Aid you believers use to make a pretense of knowledge? What is "revelation" if not the epistemological bastard child you try to sneak in the back door and give a seat at the family table? Just because you have a three-letter name/title for your ignorance concerning the Big Questions doesn't mean that you have an answer.

[IATIA]

How do you know this?

Looking at the complexity of living systems and determining that the chances that these things evolved from random chemicals is infinitely less than there being a super intelligence that designed it all.

Again, NOT!  However complex life seems to you, it is far less complex than the god that you propose that popped up without a designer.  If it is possible, beyond the realm of possibilities, (which you keep insisting), then why is it not possible for the universe and life (which are not as complex as your god, therefore higher probabilities) to exist without a "designer"?

[LadyForCamus]

Looking at the complexity of living systems and determining that the chances that these things evolved from random chemicals is infinitely less than there being a super intelligence that designed it all.

Again, NOT!  However complex life seems to you, it is far less complex than the god that you propose that popped up without a designer.  If it is possible, beyond the realm of possibilities, (which you keep insisting), then why is it not possible for the universe and life (which are not as complex as your god, therefore higher probabilities) to exist without a "designer"?

*ding, ding, ding* this is the question it all boils down to, isn't it? If a theist can provide a reasonable answer to this, I will promptly shit myself.

[Esquilax]

What is entropy, to you?

Entropy and disorder also have associations with equilibrium.[9] Technically, entropy, from this perspective, is defined as a thermodynamic property which serves as a measure of how close a system is to equilibrium — that is, to perfect internal disorder.[2] Likewise, the value of the entropy of a distribution of atoms and molecules in a thermodynamic system is a measure of the disorder in the arrangements of its particles.[10] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropy_%2...isorder%29

So, wait: now you've switched again. When you first mentioned entropy I gave a lengthy response detailing how thermodynamic entropy doesn't apply to the Earth or anything on it, and in reply to that you told me you were using the definition of entropy as used in information systems, which is completely different. Now when pressed, you're back to using the thermodynamic definition as though you hadn't used a different one just a few days ago and acted completely mystified that I would respond to it using terms applicable to the thermodynamic model. Can you maybe stick to a definition, instead of swapping between them at random?

Are you even aware that entropy is a radically different thing, depending on whether you're discussing information or thermodynamics?

[Esquilax]

Right, so what's the probability of that even happening?

Probabilities are so important, remember?

Better than abiogenesis and better than the vast multitude of species all evolving from pond slime by pot luck.

First of all, "pot luck" is a strawman, as I've already explained multiple times how we're not dealing with a totally randomized process, so you can stow that dishonesty right now.

Second of all, can you do more than just lazily assert that the odds are better? How did you derive those odds? How can you derive a positive probability for a thing you cannot possibly have observed and have consistently failed to provide positive evidence of?

And in fact, why should we even care, given that you've demonstrated clearly that you have no idea what positive evidence even is?