God Does Exist

That being said, let's get right down to his points: 1) First, Pro opens with, "My opponent wants me, apparently, to have an answer for everything concerning a deity. " For clarification, I do not expect him to have all the answers; however, I *do* expect him to argue effectively how or why a deity (God) exists. That is what the resolution calls for and the entire purpose of this debate! Just because I agree to the definition of a deity doesn't mean that deities exist. Santa Clause can be defined but that doesn't mean that he is real. As Pro, the instigator, my opponent has the BURDEN OF PROOF in affirming the resolution. He writes, "I, as the Instigator, am asking how the cosmos could have begun without a Deity. Con repeatedly attempts to shift the burden of proof on me. " Unfortunately for my opponent, he cannot make demands about MY so-called burden of proof. My only burden in this debate to negate the resolution at hand. When discussing the Cosmos, my opponent can only use this contention as it pertains to his own argument. In other words, he can use the creation of the universe to advance his own agenda, but he cannot shift the burden of proof on me (fallacy #1) to answer something about the Cosmos when that has nothing to do with the resolution. This is called a red herring fallacy (#2), which occurs when the speaker is trying to distract the audience by arguing some new topic, or just generally going off topic with an argument. In fact the only reason I responded to my opponent's argument regarding the Cosmos was to attack one of his premises with a counter-response. He is trying to distract the readers by creating false imperatives for the Con. I asked that Pro provide me with ANY type of empirical evidence that he can to sustain his KNOWLEDGE CLAIM (the resolution), and he has not. Note: The Base Rate fallacy (#3) - using weak evidence to make a probability judgment without taking into account known empirical statistics about the probability. 2) My opponent is upset that I have not accepted "the creator of the Cosmos" as an acceptable part of the definition of a deity. Here he commits the Bare Assertion fallacy (fallacy #4), which means that he claims the premise of an argument is assumed to be true purely because it says that it is true. In other words, why should I accept "creator of the Cosmos" as part of the definition of a deity when Pro has not proven that a deity has created the Cosmos? ! He says, "The vast majority of deities spanning the various religions, especially modern ones, are thought of as responsible for the creation of the cosmos. The Buddhist religion is an exception to the rule; one of the few. I find this to be a poor argument with semantics, which is usually done when one cannot defend their position with logic, facts, or even probable theories. " In addition to the utter hypocrisy (his lack of providing logical facts via empirical data), he also commits fallacy number five: Argumentum ad populum (appeal to the Gallery) which is where a proposition is claimed to be true solely because many people believe it to be true. 3) Note that my opponent did not respond to my argument regarding Anthropocentrism at ALL. 4) I do not understand how Con can conclude with such assurance that an "infinite" Creator MUST be a part of His creation. Note: Pantheism. Plus, don't monotheists believe that God is a part of everything (including nature) as well? I'd also like to point out the most OBVIOUS fallacy (the very first one you learn about in ANY logic class), where Pro claims, "If X is true, then Y is true as well. " I don't care if I lose conduct points for this - that is the WORST argument I've ever heard. It reeks of the modus tollens fallacy (number six) which by very DEFINITION OF FALLACY reads "If X is true then Y is true as well," which was my opponent's exact argument. Also, Pro said, "The reason was to show how it would be impossible for a creator to have originated in the thing that is being created. " Note that I never agreed that a deity (or God - the deity in discussion for this debate) was a creator, so this entire point is irrelevant. Another fallacy, but at this point, I can't keep up with naming and numbering them all. 5) My opponent's analogy was SEVERELY flawed and I ripped it apart. He said it serves as something showing a creator in relevance to the creation, but again, ignored my entire point regarding realities and matter, so again this is completely irrelevant and I ask that the readers disregard it. 6) Uh, entropy is when you leave matter isolated and it starts going chaotic. It does not prove that matter is not eternal. All it does is discuss how matter behaves when it is isolated. .. so what exactly are you trying to say? And why are you bringing quantum physics into this argument if you know nothing about it, Pro? 7) Pro says he doesn't know what I was talking about with my last point, so let me refresh his memory. He said that he would like to see a definite theory on how something could create itself (in order to accept my contention that the universe could have always been or created itself, etc. ) In addition to committing the false dichotomy fallacy and the negative proof fallacy, he completely ignored my arguments regarding Time Theory B, relativity, etc. Both of these explanations are scientific theories supported by Einstein WITH empirical data (at least relativity), so they must be considered superior than Pro's. He merely asks more questions instead of refuting the possibilities I put forth. That leaves us with MORE fallacies (plurium interrogationum, fallacy of the single cause, and a little appeal to ignorance as well. .. ). 8) Pro writes, "It is only natural to assume that an entirely different dimension has different laws. " So. .. he agrees with my premise that something from another dimension has different laws, and therefore the natural laws that apply to us in THIS dimension (which may prevent us from having more detailed knowledge of an explanation at this time) may be different in dimensions that can scientifically answer Pro's questions. In other words, he completely buys into my argument and you should too. Finally Pro concludes talking about creating life. .. and something about a jar of dirt. This is a TERRIBLE analogy. Obviously humanity doesn't have the knowledge on how to randomly create life at this point, so it does not take a genius to realize that Pro is putting forth another fallacious argument with his near impossible challenge. He also states that "Intelligence has to guide the creation of life. " The counter to this is simple: Evolution. Scientific examples in nature explain evolution; there is no evidence that a deity is responsible. Pro also concludes with, "Much of humanity claims that a deity exists, and for good reason" . .. another obvious appeal to majority fallacy; just because a lot of people believe it doesn't make it true. A lot of people once believed that the earth was flat - and guess what - it isn't. Note the example of a straw man here: "Life relies on intelligent design. But it would be impossible for you to create life at random, so evolution can't be true. " -- That's not an exact quote, but essentially what Pro is saying. Huge straw man fallacy here. Pro is distorting a viewpoint in such a way that the distortion is easily refuted. Character limit. .. So, in conclusion, don't talk to me about logic, Pro, when you clearly don't understand it. Don't bring physics into the argument when you don't understand that either. Don't make knowledge claims without empirical evidence. Don't shift the burden of proof or straw man my points. Good luck in R4.