Knowledge of a God's Existence or Non-Existence is Not Possible

Hello again,I hope not for the last time as I would be delighted to engage with you in the future, thoughtful respectful debates such as this are my kind of entertainment. :)Argument From Design:My statements made in the "Problem" section were meant to 1) demonstrate the insufficiency of arguments supporting ID and Creationism, and 2) provide examples of how biological evolution has greater explanatory power for why there is apparent design in the world. Remember this was an attempt to refute the basic premise as presented by the Princeton University article that I cited. Which was a general example of the argument from design, thus making my comments in the section relevant to the discussion.Response to your answer:Appealing to beauty, and a God's desire for variety in creation is a rather interesting hypothesis. This however seems somewhat abitrary though as to the distrubution of variety in regards to different species. For example, Beetles have never been regarded by men as a rather beautiful creature, but has an extreme amount of diversity. While dolphins, an animal far more appealing and graceful than the aforementioned insects only contains about 33 species.[1]You also mentioned that you believe it could be due to the process of interbreeding. This may be true for many Beetles as Humans have been using artificial selection to breed hundreds of different dog breeds from what were formerly wild wolves. This however, I believe is insufficient to describe why 22% of all described species are different species of Beetles.[2]The Moral Argument:In your first argument drawing from Kant (I wonder what he said specifically, source?) is that objective moral values are not possible without a judgement in the afterlife. Or more simply, that if wrongdoing is not punished or enforced, then they are not absolute.To this I would ask, why is that so? Can it only be demonstrated that an action was wrong, if at some point someone comes along with sufficient authority to say it is? Perhaps this is a good opportunity to discuss another important contribution to the debate in recent years, and that is Sam Harris' "Moral Landscape."[3] In his book, he argues that it is possible to derive objective moral values from science and reason, with the founding principles being the "well being of conscious creatures." As a neuroscientist, he asserts that consciousness and overall physical and psychological well being of sentient beings are of primary consideration with regard to moral decisions. His two primary premises are included in his book on pg.15, "(1) some people have better lives than others, and (2) these differences are related, in some lawful and not entirely arbitrary way, to states of the human brain and to states of the world."[3]This is a much broader and indeed pertinent debate that perhaps you and I can agree to engage on in the future, but at the present moment I comfortable to admit I am not fully decided on the matter. Though, bringing up this particular moral argument from Sam Harris does introduce another grounds for contention on whether or not moral absolutism is dependent on the existence of a deity. Of course, one must establish first that there is objective moral values in order to turn the moral argument in favor of God. :)Ontological Argument and Rebuttal to Your Case:Your first criticism attempts to apply the same critic I used for when you addressed evolution. This criticism I believe is misapplied to my arguments for the following reasons.1. The nature of this debate is whether or not knowledge of God's existence or non-existence is possible, therefore it is pertanent for me to not prove that God doesn't exist (which is something I have no desire to do, nor capacity to do so), but rather to discredit positive arguments for God's existence in order to demonstrate my initial assertion that knowledge claims about God lack sufficient justification.2. Your argument failed to provide positive support for your contention, which was that knowledge of God's existence is possible. Poking holes in abiogenesis or evolution still do not provide a positive basis for a person to claim, "I know that God exists."Argument from RationalityYou are right to say that not much is known on the matter of quantum mechanics, but I would like to see where you get the idea that Physicists theorize they are coming from different dimensions. Your entire objection is built on this unsubstationatied and unsupported point.Argument from Design Part 2 Actually the "widely accepted" theory may still be taught in certain classes, but for years now scientists have been providing research that causes most scientists to disagree with the "primordial soup thoery."[4] You also have failed to demonstrate how the problem with the theory you objected to applies to all other theories of abiogenesis, which you contended concludes abiogenesis is mathmatically impossible. Nor have you supplied the math, or sources to the math that conclusively demonstrate such a claim in the first place. Natural selection is not primary in regards to abiogenesis, but it is to evolution, perhaps key to abiogenesis is to discover how the first self replicated molecules could have formed and also how RNA first arrived. Jumping straight to a fully formed cell to point out the issues is getting WAY ahead of abiogenesis.You also fail to take into account, 1) the tremendous amount of time in Earth's history that was dominated by bacteria and mutlicellular life,[5] and 2) the very short amount of time that it takes for a bacteria to reproduce thus speeding up the rate of random mutations in a given population,[6] 3) the observed resilience of life, especially of bacteria,[7] and 4) that most theorize abiogenesis happened underwater thus protecting life from the harsh environment in the world at the time.[4]My counter argument to yoru ultimate point is that it is not UNREASONABLE to hypothesize that a God is responsible for creating the universe and life. However, as I believe I have demonstrated in my posts it still remains an unjustifiable claim to knowledge of a God's existence or non-existence.Closing Remarks:I again would like to thank Pro for a wonderful debate, and salute his truly compelling efforts to argue his position. Perhaps a less stubborn man will be convinced. :) It is important again to reiterate that my intention is not to cause disbelief in a God or Gods, but rather to rightly associate religious discource in public discource and ultimately to come to know the truth behind the nature of the assertions we make.Kindest Regards,TrueScotsman[1] http://everythingdolphins.com...;[2] http://evolution.berkeley.edu...;[3] http://en.wikipedia.org...;[4] http://www.sciencedaily.com...[5] http://en.wikipedia.org...[6] http://www.microbeworld.org...[7] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov...