The evidence that all perfectly natural mechanisms were set in place by God relies on the existence of God in the first place. Should an omnipotent and omniscient being exist, it’s trivial to show that the current universe must have at least avoided the disapproval of such a being; and it is quite possible that the universe was constructed or altered into its current form.
The evidence that all perfectly natural mechanisms were set in place by God relies on the existence of God in the first place.
That sounds less like evidence and more like an assumption. You say:
Should an omnipotent and omniscient being exist, it’s trivial to show that the current universe must have at least avoided the disapproval of such a being; and it is quite possible that the universe was constructed or altered into its current form.
I completely agree; however, I am not sure how you could get from “our Universe exists” to “an omni-being exists and takes notice of our Universe”. I do agree that going the other way is pretty easy; but we are not omniscient, so we don’t have that option.
I’m not going from “our Universe exists” to “an omni-being exists and takes notice of our Universe”. I’m going from “an omni-being exists and takes notice of our Universe” to “said being controls the universe”.
I may not have been perfectly clear upthread, so let me try rephrasing and explicitly stating what I had been taking implicitly: If God exists, then all perfectly natural mechanisms were set in place by God.
Understood; but this means that you can’t look at any natural mechanisms and interpret them as evidence for the existence of a God. That would be circular reasoning.
And the evidence for this is … ?
Very similar to the evidence for the existence of God in the first place. (In fact, it starts with that).
Sorry, I’m not sure what you mean… what starts with what ?
Maybe I should have expanded on that a little.
The evidence that all perfectly natural mechanisms were set in place by God relies on the existence of God in the first place. Should an omnipotent and omniscient being exist, it’s trivial to show that the current universe must have at least avoided the disapproval of such a being; and it is quite possible that the universe was constructed or altered into its current form.
That sounds less like evidence and more like an assumption. You say:
I completely agree; however, I am not sure how you could get from “our Universe exists” to “an omni-being exists and takes notice of our Universe”. I do agree that going the other way is pretty easy; but we are not omniscient, so we don’t have that option.
I’m not going from “our Universe exists” to “an omni-being exists and takes notice of our Universe”. I’m going from “an omni-being exists and takes notice of our Universe” to “said being controls the universe”.
I may not have been perfectly clear upthread, so let me try rephrasing and explicitly stating what I had been taking implicitly: If God exists, then all perfectly natural mechanisms were set in place by God.
Understood; but this means that you can’t look at any natural mechanisms and interpret them as evidence for the existence of a God. That would be circular reasoning.
Well, not merely on the basis of the existence of natural mechanisms at all; that would, yes, be circular reasoning.