The God Hypothesis is the best scientific explanation for existence

THE GOD HYPOTHESIS Science depends on philosophy so its impossible to not use some philosophy THE LAW OF CAUSE AND EFFECT Well first off, "Absence of evidence is not evidence of its absence", just because scientists cannot find a cause for some quantum events does not mean its evidence that some things don't have to have a cause. There are at least 10 different interpretations of quantum mechanics and some of them are fully deterministic. As physicist David Bohm, has pointed out, there are many "hidden variables" at the quantum level of reality, of which anyone could contain the sufficient reason for a certain quantum event. Victor Stenger even admits that causes for these events may someday be found in his book "God: the failed hypothesis", so any indeterminism is just ignorance in the determining conditions. Therefore, we cannot make conclusions like this with any kind of confidence especially when we don't fully understand quantum mechanics in the first place since its still in its infancy. Besides, even if we assume this from CON, Quantum events do not take place in "absolute" nothingness. It actually takes place out of a larger quantum field ,which is a part of physical reality, that enables particles to come in and out of existence. Without this field there would be no quantum events. This is another reason why its not accurate to say that a particular quantum outcome is "uncaused". Therefore, there is no reason to think that not every cause precedes an effect. However, If CON is going to say that nothing is not nothing anymore and refer to the quantum field as nothingï¿½ï¿½, then CON would not only be highly illogical but arbritrary in doing so. It is true that you cannot be purely philosophical when making any kind of argument in the scientific field, but it goes both ways. Without some type of reasonable standard of logic, Science becomes blind and ,in the process, unscientific. THE CAUSE OF THE UNIVERSE CON implies that the law of causality only operates under separate moments in time or that there are only causes that have spacial and temporal dimensions to it. On the contrary, as I pointed out in round 2, immaterial minds have causal power and I address this below, So it does not follow that the cause has to have dimensions. However, one thing I do agree with CON on is his point about the cause and effect relations. The very act of creation does imply a direct causal relationship between the cause and the effect in which this cause did not stand before and therefore would be a change that brings God into time. What I would say is that Cause and effect could have simply been simultaneous and occurr within the same moment. The moment in which God caused the universe to come into being would also be the moment the universe came into being making the cause and effect simultaneous . THE BEGINNING OF THE UNIVERSE What I mean with the universe having a beginning is that one point in the past space, time, and matter/energy came into being. At this point, called the initial singularity, gravity, space-time curvature, density etc. becomes infinite. In a place where the curvature in space-time is infinite or near infinite the laws of physics break down and do not apply. This singularity occurs in black holes and of course, the Big Bang Singularity which created most of the matter in the Universe. The aforementioned first law of thermodynamics does not hold inside a singularity and matter may be created or destroyed, as was demonstrated by the Big Bang: http://en.wikipedia.org... CON claims: "why couldn't it exist in another version of spacetime which follows different laws" It does not matter. Again, Even if we are just a tiny part of a so-called "multi-verse" with different laws of nature, their theorem would STILL require an absolute beginning from this multi-verse as well. This is because the BGV theorem carries only one assumption: If the expansion rate of any universe is greater than 0, the universe began. Unless CON can think up a way to avoid the theorems conclusion, my argument stands. THE FINE-TUNING OF THE UNIVERSE 1) Well first off, The term finely tuned is just a scientific term scientist use to describe the measurement of the laws and constants and how they fall under an extraordinarily narrow range of life permitting values. We know that present day particle physics have a whole lot of adjusted parameters like the mass of certain particles along with the strength of certain forces. How do we know the values are fine-tuned? We know through math that most of the values in the parameters will not allow life to exist if these values were smaller or larger. This means we don't need to know what values don't produce life, just the relevant values of the constants that do produce a life permitting universe. Also, even though this is called fine tuning, it does not mean its design. A cosmic designer would be one of the explanation of this fine-tuning that I am advocating but the terms are not synonymous. 2) I was not trying to argue that the universe is fined-tuned for just human life but according to the generic definition of life that scientists define, which is the ability of an organism to take in energy, metabolize it, and reproduce after its own kind. This is why I specifically said ANY kind of life to evolve and exist anywhere in the universe. If the constants were even altered just a little, You would not get chemistry or matter much less planets and stars that can serve as places where life might evolve or evolve at all. So it could be life as we know it or other kinds of life we don't know of that would not be able to exist. For example, in terms of how finely tuned these parameters would be, most of them are 1% different. However, the cosmolgical constant which refers to the expansion rate of the universe or the future eternal inflation I spoke of in round 2 is so finely tuned its tuned to 120 decimal places. If this were different, the universe would be so drastically different it would be impossible for us to evolve. So even if we assume for the sake of argument that complex life came from non-life through random mutations and natural selection, these finely-tuned parameters would still be required for any life to exist. 3) The term "Power" does have other meanings but I don't see how I was equivocating between the meanings. He needs to explain in more detail how I was equating the two meanings and not just assert it. It could be a situation where I am using both meanings at the same time. SUBSTANCE DUALISM 1) Mental properties like thoughts are not the same as physical properties or brain states. For instance, the brain itself is not sad or jubilant, but CON and I would be because these are mental states. These events such as thoughts, feelings of pain and sensory experiences do not contain physical qualities like mass, spatial dimensions and space location, are not composed of chemicals, and do not have electrical properties. I mentioned that there are abstract objects like numbers or the logical absolutes that exist. CON would be implying that these abstract objects are found in nature or brains as well. In fact, Secondary properties consist of colours, tastes, sounds, smells and textures, whereas primary properties that characterise matter such as weight, shape, size, solidity, motion. The very existence of these secondary qualities favours dualism. A strictly physical and material world arguably force us to deny them including the existence of abstract objects which are not suppose to be contingent upon anything. 2) Scientists may accept biological evolution as a fact despite its mechanism(s) not being fully understood or settled upon. However, the origin of lifeï¿½‚ï¿½ï¿½ continues to remain a mystery. CON is prematurely concluding that the origin of life is settled science but where is the evidence for this.