God and Reality (The nature of a \'Creator\')

by dhw, Thursday, June 27, 2013, 17:40 (4165 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: May I take it that you have now withdrawn the argument that an atheist belief in an infinite number of universes, which you also believe in, is a poppycock dodge to avoid design?
 
DAVID: When I discussed the possibility that God might have created other universes in the past, it was a response to your question about God's past time. We theists know He created this one, therefore that may be what He does, one after another. It is not a theory, it is not a point of faith, it is a plausable answer to your question.-On 21 June you wrote: "I think we can suppose an infinite number of universes in past eternity if we presume first cause is eternal" [which you do]. Atheists "know" that non-conscious eternal energy produced this one, therefore that may be what eternal energy does, one after another. Why is it plausible for a theist to "suppose" an infinite number of universes, but poppycock for an atheist?-dhw: I don't know where or how intelligence came to exist, because I cannot know that. All I know is that it does exist (here on Earth) and must have had a cause. The claim that the cause was an intelligence concerning which we do not know where or how it came to exist, or if it had a cause, still puts one huge mystery in place of another. If it is reasonable for you to live with one insoluble mystery because of your faith in God, it must be equally reasonable for an atheist to live with another insoluble mystery because of his faith in chance.
 
DAVID: But even you reject chance from your padded fence. How can you defend the atheists as possibly correct in their views? The evidence is skewed my way.-From my padded fence I do not believe in chance, in God, or in my panpsychist hypothesis (whether theistic or atheistic). But I realize that one of them must be closer to the truth than the others, and so I do not disbelieve or "reject" any of them. Not believing is not the same as rejecting ... a distinction many theists and atheists seem to have difficulty understanding. In discussions with theists, I tend to offer atheist objections, and vice versa. My human reason and experience, however, are appallingly limited, and because of these limitations, there are few arguments I would dare to dismiss as "poppycock". I can only try to explain as rationally as possible why I don't believe them.