I was thinking along similar lines but didn’t post because I was talking myself in circles. So I gave up and weighted the hypothesis that this kind of philosophy is insoluble. Here’s what I wrote:
In such a debate, what is the end goal—what counts as winning the debate question? If they provide a hypothesis that invokes God, is it sufficient to just provide another plausible hypothesis that doesn’t? (Then, done.)
Or do you really need to address the root of the root of the question: Why are we here? (Even if you have multi-verses, why are they all here?) And “why” isn’t really the question anyway. It’s just a complaint, “I don’t understand the source of everything.” … “If there is a source ‘G’, I don’t understand the source of ‘G’.”
You can’t answer that question: The property “always existing” or the transition between “not existing and then existing” is a mystery; it’s the one thing atheists and theists can agree on. How does giving it a name mean anything more? So I think the best argument is that invoking God doesn’t answer the question either.
Unless is the problem really about whether or not this is evidence that something wanted us to be here? Then finding plausible scientific hypothesis for X,Y, Z would never answer the question. You would always have remaining, did someone want this all to be so?
And I got stuck there, because if something exists, to what extent was it “willed” has no meaning to me at the moment.
I was thinking along similar lines but didn’t post because I was talking myself in circles. So I gave up and weighted the hypothesis that this kind of philosophy is insoluble. Here’s what I wrote:
In such a debate, what is the end goal—what counts as winning the debate question? If they provide a hypothesis that invokes God, is it sufficient to just provide another plausible hypothesis that doesn’t? (Then, done.)
Or do you really need to address the root of the root of the question: Why are we here? (Even if you have multi-verses, why are they all here?) And “why” isn’t really the question anyway. It’s just a complaint, “I don’t understand the source of everything.” … “If there is a source ‘G’, I don’t understand the source of ‘G’.”
You can’t answer that question: The property “always existing” or the transition between “not existing and then existing” is a mystery; it’s the one thing atheists and theists can agree on. How does giving it a name mean anything more? So I think the best argument is that invoking God doesn’t answer the question either.
Unless is the problem really about whether or not this is evidence that something wanted us to be here? Then finding plausible scientific hypothesis for X,Y, Z would never answer the question. You would always have remaining, did someone want this all to be so?
And I got stuck there, because if something exists, to what extent was it “willed” has no meaning to me at the moment.