My problem with Evangelical Atheism

[Andara Bledin]

I'm not trying to prove anything and that question is too convoluted for me to wrap my head around right now.

Someone else claimed that proof of absence existed, and I'd like a citation.

^-.-^

[Rapscallion]

I'm not trying to prove anything and that question is too convoluted for me to wrap my head around right now.

From what I've seen, it's the main argument being used against the reason brought into the thread - to whit, "My god is cannot be proved, so there." I'll simplify it, if your god keeps hiding and doesn't always do things that are 'good' by reasonable definition of said term, then why even believe in it?

Rapscallion

[Andara Bledin]

From what I've seen, it's the main argument being used against the reason brought into the thread - to whit, "My god is cannot be proved, so there." I'll simplify it, if your god keeps hiding and doesn't always do things that are 'good' by reasonable definition of said term, then why even believe in it?

Rapscallion

Nice way to trivialize it into a bunch of 3rd grade "so there" pouting.

As has been explained ad nauseum already, both here and in other threads, "my God" does not outright prove that He exists because the whole point of believing is having faith. If you believe something that has been proving, then it's not truly faith, it's just accepting the facts.

My personal argument, and apparently that of others, is that we lack the awareness/tools/technology/etc to prove or disprove the existence of God, but that we choose to believe that He does exist despite this.

The counter-argument is that we do have the technology/knowledge to prove that he doesn't exist and have done so.

This is obviously news to a large number of people who would like a citation or two so that we can make our own decisions rather than trusting a semi-random voice on the Internet claiming to know the facts.

^-.-^

[Rapscallion]

Nice way to trivialize it into a bunch of 3rd grade "so there" pouting.

Seems pretty accurate to me.

As has been explained ad nauseum already, both here and in other threads, "my God" does not outright prove that He exists because the whole point of believing is having faith. If you believe something that has been proving, then it's not truly faith, it's just accepting the facts.

As far as I'm concerned, going around on a debate forum saying, "I believe in X" is something that can be challenged. It's a statement of belief in something, but the main defence is apparently that what the person believes in cannot be proven in either way, so they're going to keep believing that and then thumb the nose at all around.

See, this thread started out about how evangelical atheists are offensive. Right now, it's degenerated into a load of theists tripping over their own feet in a haste to defend their particular beliefs.

Oddly enough, that doesn't bother me so much as the content of the claims. I find someone going around saying, "I believe in something that can't be proven to exist, nor to not exist," fairly offensive. It's an abrogation of personal responsibility.

My personal argument, and apparently that of others, is that we lack the awareness/tools/technology/etc to prove or disprove the existence of God, but that we choose to believe that He does exist despite this.

What this boils down to to me is that there's no way to prove that your god exists, and your god isn't exactly jumping out from behind the curtains shouting, "Surprise! Have some manna!". I've seen it try to be rationalised away in several ways, eventually down to the idea that god is nature and therefore there anyway. Strip away the superstition, and the desperate desire to avoid being wrong steps in and tries to slide the same notion into what can be shown to exist, but once again without any backing.

At least with the more standard forms of concepts of a god in the christian sense there's a huge swell of ancient tradition to back up the concept of a divine existence, but this? It's grasping at straws.

Again, I have to say that if your god doesn't answer prayers unless it suits it, if it doesn't show itself in any way, if it doesn't actually help out, why is it regarded as a god?

The counter-argument is that we do have the technology/knowledge to prove that he doesn't exist and have done so.

What GK has demonstrated in my opinion is that the traditional forms of a monotheistic deity cannot be sustained as concepts.

This is obviously news to a large number of people who would like a citation or two so that we can make our own decisions rather than trusting a semi-random voice on the Internet claiming to know the facts.

If someone makes a decision on a debate forum in spite of the evidence available and is surprised and dismayed that they're challenged on it, then maybe they need to examine what they're doing.

Besides, at least you've been presented with facts. Looking back at some of the claims in this thread, it's far more than others have given. Those offerings have mostly been vague hopes.

Rapscallion

[Sleepwalker]

The counter argument is that it is ludicrous to believe in something BECAUSE there is no evidence for it. Special pleading, you'd not accept it for anything other than your pet religion.

[Andara Bledin]

It's an abrogation of personal responsibility.

How?

What responsibility am I not taking care of by believing in God?

It's really tiring to hear about how my belief in God somehow makes me irresponsible, or mean, or evil, or uncaring or affects anything at all other than that I believe as opposed to not.

It's all a bunch of ridiculous bigotry, really.

What GK has demonstrated in my opinion is that the traditional forms of a monotheistic deity cannot be sustained as concepts.

How? He used a lot of interesting terms and strung them together in apparently coherent sentences, but I still have not seen any backing for any of his statements.

For all I know, it's just a load of sophistry. All I want is more than a single source. A citation or corroboration of any form would be appreciated.

If someone makes a decision on a debate forum in spite of the evidence available and is surprised and dismayed that they're challenged on it, then maybe they need to examine what they're doing.

Besides, at least you've been presented with facts. Looking back at some of the claims in this thread, it's far more than others have given. Those offerings have mostly been vague hopes.

There has been no evidence presented - merely the statement that there is evidence and a description of some phenomenon that is claimed to be it.

Citation needed.

^-.-^

[siead_lietrathua]

Again, I have to say that if your god doesn't answer prayers unless it suits it, if it doesn't show itself in any way, if it doesn't actually help out, why is it regarded as a god?

i approached this one before in a way. for us to say that a god has to show itself, has to help us and has to answer prayers is just a form of human arrogance. a god doesnt have to care about us, we just want it to so we feel superior to the other creatures on the planet.

[Gravekeeper]

How? He used a lot of interesting terms and strung them together in apparently coherent sentences, but I still have not seen any backing for any of his statements.

My original statement and what caused this whole mess was that the quantum level was the last level of science that still had room for the possibility of a deity ( Or indeed any non-physical intellect ). With the basic natural laws of the universe, the universe can and has created everything we've got. If you've got matter, gravity and energy, you'll get stars, planets, galaxies, etc. Out of all that, you will get habitable planets through straight up probability and eventually life.

The universe exists on such a scale that even the probability of "perfect" worlds like Earth is just an eventual outcome. We can squawk about how rare and special Earth is all we want. But when you pan out the numbers, life is likely quite a bit more common then you'd think. Civilizations such as ourselves are likewise quite a bit more common than you'd think.

In fact, we pegged the average number of planets per stars in a study about a week ago or so at around 1.6 per star if I recall. Running the numbers on the Drake Equation gives us around another 1400 detectable civilizations in the Milky Way. 1400. But that's out of 200-400 billion stars. But its also just in one galaxy. There are at least 100 billion galaxies in the universe and thats just estimated based on what we can currently observe.

So 1400 x 100 billion is how many times our little experiment here is repeating itself. And that's only detectable civilizations. AKA those with sufficient or greater technology to be detectable.

And you know what created it all? Gravity, basically. Good ol' fashion gravity. Gravity will create planets. Gravity will create stars. Gravity will even deliver water to said planets using ice from the gas left over from the formation of said stars. Gravity will hold an atmosphere and liquid water to the surface of a planet. Gravity will, through sheer apocolyptic attrition, sort a solar system out into a neat little line of planetary bodies. Some of which will naturally fall within the habitable zone of the star. Some of those will naturally be rocky planets. Some of those rocky planets will naturally end up being large enough to hold an atmosphere and liquid water. Some of those will naturally end up being bombarded with ice from space ending up with liquid water. See where this is going?

Gravity is, scientifically speaking, pretty much God. This is why interference is such a problem. It directly contravines the established rules and by its very nature throws everything out of balance. There is no point in interfering with what is already working just fine and in fact the act of interfering would in and of itself create an equal effect to the cause when it pans out across a universal scale. If you interfere to create A somewhere, the ripple effect will eventually prevent A from occurring elsewhere if not multiple elsewheres. Negating the point of interfering to create A to begin with.

This is the entire problem. Direct interference makes no logical sense for a being that can grasp cause and effect even at our level of intelligence. Nevermind the philosophical issues involved. Waving away these critical issue with "Well he's God, we just don't understand cus he's smarter, lawl" is a logical fallacy based entirely on faith. Not science or reason.

As I said before, if you want to have faith thats fine, just admit its faith and be done with it. But don't strut it up to science or reason like its on the same playing field. It's not.

Citation needed.

And there's your problem, and the problem I've been having the entire time with HYHYBT. I should not have to cite established scientific facts and principles. If you don't understand them, no offence, but go read a book. I'm not talking about any sort of great mysteries here. I'm not even any sort of scientist. I just tend to keep up on a few geeky science blogs because I'm a nerd ;p

And once again, for the record, I'm not an Atheist. I'd just like to think that if there's something out there and its responsible for building the sandbox, its gotta be smarter than this.

[KabeRinnaul]

This is why interference is such a problem. It directly contravines the established rules and by its very nature throws everything out of balance. There is no point in interfering with what is already working just fine and in fact the act of interfering would in and of itself create an equal effect to the cause when it pans out across a universal scale. If you interfere to create A somewhere, the ripple effect will eventually prevent A from occurring elsewhere if not multiple elsewheres. Negating the point of interfering to create A to begin with.

I think this is the particular point HYHYBT is having problems with, and I admit I don't follow, myself. I don't understand why introducing A in one place must necessarily result in -A elsewhere. I mean, granted, I understand why it must be within the realms of science, that's essentially conservation of energy at play. However, working from the assumption of a being that can alter of suspend natural laws (which it seems to be what we've defined a miracle as), why would violating that particular law be beyond it's ability?

Actually, if said being exists outside of what we observe as our reality, would it even be violating conservation of energy? At that point, the reality we observe would cease to be a closed system.

I also contend that it's possible we have already observed the outcome of such an interference, but simply do not recognize it as such because we have no outside reference point by which to judge that anything is amiss.

[Andara Bledin]

If you interfere to create A somewhere, the ripple effect will eventually prevent A from occurring elsewhere if not multiple elsewheres. Negating the point of interfering to create A to begin with.

There are a lot of assumptions in this statement that I just don't see any evidence to support.

Not all interference is equal, and not all will result in the types of negative ripple you describe. Also, that ignores the possibility that a reduction in result A after a more immediate result of A was the desired outcome to begin with.

I honestly think that typical human hubris has resulted in otherwise intelligent individuals drastically underestimating the sheer complexity of the underpinnings of the universe and overestimating just how far we've really gone in discovering how it all works.

^-.-^

[Gravekeeper]

I think this is the particular point HYHYBT is having problems with, and I admit I don't follow, myself. I don't understand why introducing A in one place must necessarily result in -A elsewhere.

Because science. Rawrgh. Everything is a deeply interconnected web of systems on every level. The very nature of interference is to alter, suspend or violate one of the core rules governing this insanely complete interdependent web of systems. Violating a natural law is not some little thing you can just brush away. It creates an error in these systems. Something is no longer the way natural law dicated it should be. This error would than ripple outwards as everything that depended on the intial state that was changed/altered would as a result take on a different state than what it would have had, had things gone according to the regular rules. You can't just change one thing, because by doing so, you change everything connected to that one thing and everything connected to those things so and so forth. Basically a cosmic Butterfly Effect.

Lets use traffic as an example. Traffic lights, per their rules, go green, yellow, red, repeat. They in turn govern the flow of traffic. But someone steps in and changes one set of lights to suddenly go green instead of red to let one person get to work sooner. Accidents ensue. People are injured. The accidents cause delays at that intersection. The delays ripple out to nearby streets. Traffic reroutes. Commutes take longer. People are late for work. Workplaces are effected with lower productivity and generate less service/product. This in turn affects other people and workplaces that depend on them in turn affected the people/workplaces that depend on those people and workplaces. The people who are injured in turn reduce emergency services and medical care that would have gone elsewhere. Other people may be injured or die as a result of the allocation of resources. Other people that weren't suppose to live may survive as a result. Everyone that knew them or worked with them is suddenly affected. Which in turn affects everyone they know. Etc etc etc etc.

All because "God" intervened and changed the rules to grant one guy a quicker drive to work. Rather than letting the rules that were created to handle the situation handle the situation.

I also contend that it's possible we have already observed the outcome of such an interference, but simply do not recognize it as such because we have no outside reference point by which to judge that anything is amiss.

But the thing is, we do. Understanding the intial conditions and rules that govern the possible changes in conditions in turn allows us to parse the outcome. To use my previous example: If you fill a balloon with water then pop it, we know water will come out. If BEES came out, that would be a violation. ( Though OH GOD BEES wouldn't be much of a miracle ).

The very definition of interference is to basically take A > B > C and change it A > D > C. As a result, we look at A and C and go "D isn't suppose to be there, it should be a B" and thus it can be observed. If an attempt is made to hide the evidence, it becomes A > C and we go "Wait, B should be there" and thus it can be observed. If the interference is made to look perfectly natural than A > B > C becomes....A > B > C, thus making the interference pointless as thats already how it would have worked and the natural laws of the universe would have reached that outcome by themselves.

Causing interference, in essence, simply does not make any sense.

[Gravekeeper]

There are a lot of assumptions in this statement that I just don't see any evidence to support.

Its. Logic. Argh. With the sheer size of the universe changing the state of conditions somewhere is going to change the state of conditions of everything that depends on the original state.

Not all interference is equal, and not all will result in the types of negative ripple you describe. Also, that ignores the possibility that a reduction in result A after a more immediate result of A was the desired outcome to begin with.

It is not a matter of positive and negative ripples. That was just an example of outcomes that will, after sufficient time in the system, occur as a result of changing intial states. It is a matter of balance and imbalance. The universe doesn't give a shit about positive or negative. It is a matter of changing states between what natural law dicates and what it did not dictate in a system where everything is dictated by natural law. Changing the intial state will create both "positive" and "negative" effects if you want to look at it that way, but that doesn't matter, what matters is that the effects are not in balance with what the natural laws of the universe dicates they should be.

You are looking at this with far too narrow an understanding of the scale the universe operates on. You cannot change the state of one thing without affecting the state of everything that is dependent on the intial state of that one thing and everything that depends on their states, and everything that depends on their states, and so on and so forth.

I honestly think that typical human hubris has resulted in otherwise intelligent individuals drastically underestimating the sheer complexity of the underpinnings of the universe and overestimating just how far we've really gone in discovering how it all works.

I'll toss that statement right back at you, but would venture that you're underestimating just how far we've really come instead. We don't know all the secrets of the universe, but we know enough to dismiss the sort of reasoning being used against science in this thread so far.

[Duelist925]

Gk, No one has argued against Science here. And I tend to agree with Andara on this--you may be overestimating how much we really understand.

Hell, physicists are even speculating that they might have been wrong, and that the Higgs Boson might not exist. The thing they built the entire LHC to find, might not be there.

But I'm not going to argue that. Instead, I would like to point out one flaw in your reasoning--you keep stating that changing one of the fundamental laws would change it everywhere. If there is a god, and he/she/it is all powerful...why is that the case?

Hell, I can use an episode of Star Trek as an example. In one episode, the semi godlike Q is rendered powerless, and left aboard the Enterprise, which is trying to stop an asteroid from crashing into a planet. They ask Q for advice, since he knows...well, everything, and he states he'd change the Gravitational constant. They cant do that...at least not on a universal scale. However, they figure out how to use their SCIENCE!!! and technobabble to change the gravitational constant of the meteor itself, and nothing else.

If a hack sci fi writer can think of something like that, why couldnt a supposedly omniscient/all powerful being? Why wouldn't it be able to alter one of the fundamental laws in one area, and yet keep them the same in all other areas? How in the hell would we detect that?

And please, dont just say "Ripples". I want to actually know how we'd measure it.


For that matter, your traffic example is flawed. Because 99 percent of the people affected wouldn't know what happened. People wouldn't know "God changed a light, so I'm late for work" they'd know, "some cop says turn left, I turn left, Im late for work". They wouldn't detect or deduct interference from god. They'd assume some asshole ran a red, or that there was a computer glitch that changed the light.

If we have no reason to look for gods interference in something, we wont find gods interference in something. The main problem I have with your arguement that we would be able to detect gods interference in the natural order, is how in the nine hells of Gygax would we know it was interference from a devine being, and not just some new scientific phenomenon, or strange coincidence that pops from time to time?


Let me give you an example.

A woman trips down the stairs on her way to do laundry, breaks a few ribs. She goes to the emergency room to get checked out, and there it's discovered, through a test the doctor adds to pad the bill, that she has breast cancer. Its caught early, so it's removed without too much danger--she lives.

Where was gods interference?

Another

A star goes supernova in its final stages, and goes out with a bang. The explosion sends much of the asteroid and comet belt surrounding the star flying into space. One of these balls of rock and ice smashes into a planet in the goldiocks zone of its solar system, and amidst the heat, the steam, and rock, life begins to spread from the tardigrade type lifeforms that had been frozen in the comet.

Where was gods hand in that?

Did god interfere in either of those scenarios at all? Was he responsible for any of the things that happened? All of them? None of them? How in the hell would we know?

[HYHYBT]

Thank you; that's pretty much exactly what I've been trying to say.

Specifically, I've not been trying to push a view at all. I've been trying to examine what appeared to be enormous holes in logic. (Not in evidence. Strictly logic.) If the claims put forth are true, then the sooner I find out that's really the case the better, but the holes make it look otherwise. So I point at these (apparent) holes, and ask what's in them or how you get across them. The resistance to showing what is in them, or even to acknowledging their existence, makes it all the more likely that the holes are real.

And the whole business of dismissing out of hand any suggestion that God (or whatever), if he exists, could *possibly* be up to something logical that seems illogical to those who only ever can see a small part as "hand waving" is itself not only illogical, but a sort of reverse logic. Really; even *people* make sensible plans that others don't see as so until they know the whole thing. Declaring that anything a logical God would do we would necessarily figure out is essentially declaring that God (if any) must be equal to or less than human.

[Gravekeeper]

Gk, No one has argued against Science here. And I tend to agree with Andara on this--you may be overestimating how much we really understand.

On the contrary, HYHYT has been arguing on the basis of reason and logic. That has, in fact, been the entire sticking point of our argument. Also, seeing as neither HYHYBT nor Andara has seemingly been able to understand what I've been talking about, I would say they're underestimating. Seeing as I've largely been working from Hawkin's books.

Hell, physicists are even speculating that they might have been wrong, and that the Higgs Boson might not exist. The thing they built the entire LHC to find, might not be there.

And what exactly? The very thing that started this entire argument was me saying that quantum mechanics, aka the thing the LHC was built to investigate, was the last true realm of possibility for finding any evidence for the existence of non-physical intelligence such as a deity. >.>

Again, I am not an Atheist here. I'm just being realistic about this.

But I'm not going to argue that. Instead, I would like to point out one flaw in your reasoning--you keep stating that changing one of the fundamental laws would change it everywhere. If there is a god, and he/she/it is all powerful...why is that the case?

Congradulations, that is a "Mysterious Ways" argument and one of the big problems thats been running in this entire thread. You cannot answer "Explain why this is possible despite all evidence to the contrary" with "Because God". The construct of God is entirely a human invention as are the powers and abilities attributed to him. Basically, I have said "People can't fly" and you have said "Sure they can, look at Superman".

That aside, you're missing my point as well. In a universe that is intimately based on interdependent states, you cannot change one without affecting the others. It is impossible and stating "God can do it cus he's God" does not negate this fact and again has utterly no basis in reason, logic or science.

I'll make this extremely simple: You pop a balloon. God changes the state of the balloon back to a whole balloon. Its state has changed contrary to what it should be based on the timeline of evidence and events. This immediately affects everyone's perception of the balloon. The air in the balloon that was suppose to be let out has been put back into the balloon. The air that would have been displaced by the air being released from the ballon is no longer displaced. Microganisms that were trapped in the balloon and would have been released have now been retrapped. Etc etc etc . Its a very minor thing, but there's a complex spider web of things dependent upon its state from a micro to macro level and they're all impossible to avoid because they change based purely on the changing of the target state. As long as the target state has been changed, so too will the dependent states. This is unavoidable.

It is not that hard of a concept to understand and arguments to the contrary so far have been faith based which is the entire problem.

They cant do that...at least not on a universal scale. However, they figure out how to use their SCIENCE!!! and technobabble to change the gravitational constant of the meteor itself, and nothing else.

Well, first of all, Star Trek scripts were written story first, mechanics later. They literally would insert "<technobabble>" into the script and let someone else figure out an excuse. >.>

Second of all, what? You just helped my point. In this scenario, the natural laws of the universe dicated one thing, and they were contravened to create a different outcome that runs directly against the determined outcome. A direct, observable change has been made and the balance dictated by the universe has been throw out of whack creating a massive fall out of imbalances that run directly contrary to what should have happened.

How in the hell would we detect that?

And please, dont just say "Ripples". I want to actually know how we'd measure it.

Um...the same way we measure every other body in space? You do realise that half the shit we figured out about the universe, we do so because we can use the natural laws of gravity as baseline and observe minut changes that indicate the presence of what we're looking for, right? That we can detect ridiculously minut anamolies in gravity based on the course of ridiculously tiny objects?

An asteroid that suddenly changed course contravening the laws of gravity would be to talk of the entire scientific community for decades.

For that matter, your traffic example is flawed. Because 99 percent of the people affected wouldn't know what happened. People wouldn't know "God changed a light, so I'm late for work" they'd know, "some cop says turn left, I turn left, Im late for work". They wouldn't detect or deduct interference from god. They'd assume some asshole ran a red, or that there was a computer glitch that changed the light.

That was not the point of that example, the point of that example was to demonstrate how much of a shitstorm direct intervention would cause in a universe of interdependent states. Also, your counterpoint is completely flawed because obviously everyone directly affected would want to know what happened. An investigation into what happened would occur. It'd go all over the local news ( "Mysterious Light Change Kills 6, Injures 5" ). If no real reason was found, it would turn into an uproar. People would be blamed and sued and it would generally be a huge mess. -.-

The main problem I have with your arguement that we would be able to detect gods interference in the natural order, is how in the nine hells of Gygax would we know it was interference from a devine being, and not just some new scientific phenomenon, or strange coincidence that pops from time to time?

First of all, the type of intervention often attributed to God is of a sort that would show up on the radar of current science.

Second of all, more subtle manipulation, aka using a God of Gaps approach to just keep moving the goal posts out till you hit something insigficant enough to escape notice, has a laundry list of logical, philosophical and scientific problems. Which no one has thus far answered aside from yet more "Because he's God".

Third of all, a coincidence is just the occurence of an event with low probability.

Finally, let me turn that right around on you: Why is God even a viable possibility? This is the entire problem with this dicussion. The very act of inserting God as a possibility is itself an act of faith. Which is why trying to argue that it is reasonable or logical is fundementally flawed. The idea of God is a human construct. There is no evidence, no indication, no mechanism, nothing that suggests his existence. Inserting him as a possibility is illogical and claiming otherwise is fallacy.

A woman trips down the stairs on her way to do laundry, breaks a few ribs. She goes to the emergency room to get checked out, and there it's discovered, through a test the doctor adds to pad the bill, that she has breast cancer. Its caught early, so it's removed without too much danger--she lives.

Where was gods interference?

No where, you mistake probability for intervention. Statistically speaking if enough people fall downstairs eventually probability stats one of them will have undiagnosed cancer. Probability operating as it should is not intervention.

A star goes supernova in its final stages, and goes out with a bang. The explosion sends much of the asteroid and comet belt surrounding the star flying into space. One of these balls of rock and ice smashes into a planet in the goldiocks zone of its solar system, and amidst the heat, the steam, and rock, life begins to spread from the tardigrade type lifeforms that had been frozen in the comet.

Where was gods hand in that?

No where, this scenario would eventually happen through simple probability. The universe has at least 100 billion galaxies of several hundred billion stars each, each one with 1.6 planets per star existing on a time scale far beyond our tiny little lifespans. This scenario is inevitable through simple probability.

Also, its much more common for gases to be converted into ice during the formation of a star and then naturally hit forming planetary bodies in the same solar system. Due to the magic of gravity and gravitational accretion ( Gravity = God -.- ).

Did god interfere in either of those scenarios at all? Was he responsible for any of the things that happened? All of them? None of them? How in the hell would we know?

You're missing the laundry list too. There is no need for God to interfere at all in any of these scenarios as they already naturally occur based on the laws of the universe that are already established. Your scenarios are only viable examples if you can demonstrate that they are occurring at a rate far in exceedence of what the universe would dicate. In other words, if EVERY person with cancer went to the hospital with something minor and had their life saved when the cancer was discovered. If EVERY solar system had a planet containing life. You must demonstrate something that has occurred outside of what natural law dictates, otherwise intervention is pointless and only creates scientific and philosophical problems for the universe due to it being built upon a system of intimately interdepedent states.

Hence my original statement that the natural laws of the universe take care of everything just fine by themselves and do not require intervention still stands. None of you have demonstrated any reason why intervention would occur, nor any evidence intervention has occurred nor any answer to the list of problems intervention would case. As such, you argue from faith and your argument has no basis whatsoever in the realm of reason.

So please stop trying to put it there already. You have your faith and thats fine, but don't bring it into the realm of reason and try to argue with it. I don't give a rats ass what you believe in your personal life, that's your right. But don't bring it into a debate and claim its reasonable. Its not.

There's a reason its called "Faith" afterall.

Thank you; that's pretty much exactly what I've been trying to say.

Good, that means I can off two birds with one stone.