Which is one of the prime reasons why I don’t want it confused as to what the court did in the OP, which involved secular humanism, not atheism.
“But if the Establishment Clause lacks a religious basis, then it’s an atheist law, and so…”
This is the weakest of arguments and a very tired and pathetic one at that.
Why can’t the universe be the thing not subject to your rule? Why introduce another step of a god creating itself and then creating the universe?
If god needed no creator or has always existed, why can the same principles not be applied to the universe?
My seven year old daughter saw through this one.
But if you then hold the position that there is no beginning, that, too is supra-natural.
In what way?
It is reasonable to believe that all things have a cause. Because all things we know about, have a cause. I grant that this may ultimately be incorrect, but based on the knowledge we have, the default is to assume that all things have causes.
The destruction of the universe that birthed this one would be the cause. Ultimately, you arrive at a point where the thing could not have been cause. And at that point you are in the realm of the supra-natural. The world off God, gods, etc.
For weak atheism, I’d agree.
Or the world of universes that were always there without the need of gods. Speculatively, one is just as likely as the other.
There was an even called the Big Bang? What caused it? Nothing. Nothing happened between T-1 and T?
I think you guys are missing the point here.
Now that we are a religion and receive the powers associated with it, who shall we persecute?
I vote on people who drive vehicles that harm the environment and are too poor to upgrade. There seems to be a moral justification and class stratification is inbuilt.
Do you know what a scientist says at this point? “We don’t know yet, but we are striving to find out.”
Dawkins asks for evidence on whether religious claims are true, i.e. the claims that the religious make themselves. And they are mighty big claims.
Theology, if it is anything, is a means of ensuring such claims never get tested on a true/false basis. It is an exercise in hand-waving and circular reasoning. It has to be because it dare not make any more testable claims now that Newton, Einstein, Mendel et al dared to think and test and question.
Of course the arguments of atheists are not respected by the religious. Theology does not do straight questions, straight answers or evidence. They wouldn’t know an insightful argument if it smote them verily.
That doesn’t answer the question at all – if this is so, than God has a cause too. There’s no logical reason to decide that the same rules that apply to universe wouldn’t also apply to any God.
Why?
Why? Why wouldn’t this also have a cause? What’s special about the concept of God beyond the reverence in which some human cultures have held it?
You are assuming there was a t-1. In fact you seem to be suggesting that god was that t-1 but that for some reason there was no god-1.
Why can there be a t-1but no god-1?
Yes, and in doing so they are assuming that there is cause involved. If not, in what way are they using scientific inquiry?
There are two different realms: the natural world and the supra-natural world. Causation is tied to the former.
Because, in our world, the natural one, you can’t have an cause that was not itself caused.
Because ultimately you need something that that does not need a cause to exist.
Also, when I talk about God/god, I’m tying it to nothing. Assume that everything we know about every religion we’ve ever heard about is 100% wrong.
I understand some people believe in this supernatural world, but why should I? Why is this a reasonable default position?
Why do we need this?
I know. So why would we assume that there’s a supernatural world?
Not if there are infinite turtles all the way down.
Right.
You see the only way you could arrive at a first cause is if your tenet was the exact opposite, namely ‘NOT everything has a cause.’
‘Everything has a cause’ leads to infinity. no beginnings at all
And do you know what a scientist doesn’t say at this point? “We don’t know yet, but we’re pretty sure it was God.”
'Cause, ya know, we have no evidence for this “God” thing.
CMC fnord!