ThiChi said:
: Don?t get me wrong, I respect your views ten fold....
Whatever. But your statement, "Too bad your site did not include Dr. Kindall's reply.........I wonder why?" strongly suggests that I'm hiding something, namely, Kindall's reply which I don't want anyone to see because it might contain arguments I can't or don't want to address. On the contrary, I want people to see his reply, because it's a typical example of creationist "arguments from ignorance" (i.e., "I can't understand how this can be true so it isn't."). So you jumped to a conclusion that you thought would prejudice other creationists against my other statements. Isn't that right, ThiChi?
: however, I feel the truth of the matter is still a matter for debate....
This is why I said that arguing these matters with creationists is like trying to pick up mercury with your fingers. You're not being specific here. "The truth of the matter" doesn't specify whether you're talking about the creation/evolution debate in general, or one or more of the various questions you replied to above. Assuming you mean any or all of these things, your statement is trivially true -- of course it's a matter for debate.
On to your earlier post:
: "...therefore a intelligent designer would also require another intelligent designer ad infinitum."
: You have only presented a False Dilemma here, and as such have violated your own claims.
There's no "False Dilemma" here. Creationists claim that, according to our experience, life comes only from life, and "complex" things only come into being when an intelligent being makes them. It would be inconsistent to make any exceptions, and so, while there's a dilemma, it's not a false one. Any exceptions -- extraordinary claims -- must be justified by extremely good arguments and extraordinary evidence.
: If God is a being that is unlimited in time,
If, if, if. This "if" needs to be justified.
: and if He has access to every piece of time as if it were now,
Another unjustified "if".
These two "if" statements are unjustifed (and probably in principle unjustifiable) assumptions.
: the question of who created God is an invalid question.
Since your assumptions are unjustified, your conclusion is logically invalid.
: The problem is like asking a student to draw a four-sided triangle.
Not at all. We know that by definition a triangle has three sides. That's why it's called a TRI-angle. We know nothing of any supposed God apart from assumptions and personal revelations -- things that are notoriously unreliable. I'm sure you can think of as many false claims of personal revelation as I can.
: The terminology is self-contradictory.
Only in your example.
: It is easy to make an argument for God??s existence from a cosmological standpoint.
Easy to make an argument. Impossible to make a logically valid one given the assumptions and lack of evidence you've presented, as I will show.
: As the years have gone by, a growing amount of scientific data has accumulated which negates atheistic assumptions about how matter and the cosmos came into existence and how it has arrived at its present condition.
A baseless statement. Evidence, please.
: I have been impressed with an increasing awareness on the part of many scientists and theologians that science and religion are symbiotic disciplines.
Some scientists have always held this view. It's not new. The only new thing is an increased mouthiness on the part of a few so-called Intelligent Design Creationists. But even their chief spokesman, Phillip Johnson, is a lawyer who is demonstrably ignorant of real science.
: If God created matter/energy, and designed the systems that have propelled matter into its present arrangement,
There you go with those "ifs" again.
: who or what accomplished that for God?
Now here's a fine example of a totally meaningless statement. All you've said is, "If God created a bunch of stuff, then who created that stuff?"
: Why is it any more reasonable to believe that God has always ""been"" than it is to say that matter has always ""been""?
It's not. And that's Rem's point. Both are assumptions, both are equally unproveable, and both are equally probable/improbable.
: As Carl Sagan has said, ""If we say that God has always been, why not save a step and conclude that the universe has always been?""
Exactly. It's obvious, though, that you don't understand Sagan's point.
: From a purely scientific standpoint, it is easy to demonstrate that matter cannot be eternal in nature.
If it's so easy, let's see you do it.
: The problem here is that many people have a mistaken concept of God. If we conceive of God as physical, anthropomorphic (like man) being, the question of God??s origin is valid.
True.
: However, such a concept of God is alien to common sense.
Yet another unjustified claim. Nothing you've written in this post lends credence to it. You've given nothing but bald claims and unjustified assumptions.
I hope you see now, ThiChi, why I said that your 'reasoning' is typical of the bad argumentation coming from creationists. You fail to connect the simplest of dots and don't even know it.
AlanF
