The Evidence Points to Atheism

Non-Cognitivism Con begins his response at the end of his round. He starts by attacking premise 2 (which I'm shocked by) saying “Meaning is not based on our understanding”. The flaw here is that the definition disagrees with him. “the thing one intends to convey especially by language” The problem is, the definition says “the thing one” this is obviously talking about a human. How does one convey something if that something is not within our understanding and experience. Convey is defined as “to impart or communicate by statement, suggestion, gesture, or appearance <struggling to convey his feelings>” [1] His response is clearly debunked. If Con wants to hold to this response, then I challenge Con to convey something meaningful that doesn't refer to anything that's within our understanding or experience. Con then commits a red herring fallacy. He says “Perfection is God because God told us he is perfect.” This is irrelevant, it's agreeing with what I said and does nothing to the argument. “If God is omnipotent, and he is all-powerful, and he has influence over virtually anything” The problem is your assuming “Omnipotence” has meaning. When someone says they influenced something it means they have the power to produce an effect. However as Michael Martin said, our understanding and experience of an effect in sentient beings is a bodily action. The term ceases to have meaning when applied to God. The rest of what Con said doesn't do anything to the argument. Saying God is outside our standard of existence doesn't give God meaning anymore than saying a “zuhsde” is outside our standard of existence gives it meaning. It's irrelevant, the point is, we can't have a concept of this “God” until it's meaningfully defined! If you say this thing is outside our standard of existence, you're arguing for my position and against yours! If God was meaningful, why does Con have to appeal to an unknown standard of existence? This argument hasn't been refuted. Con's case. Anthropic Principle. Con first gives us 2 fine tuned attributes of our Earth 1, The Earth is the correct size for our atmosphere 2, The Earth is at the perfect place for life These have various problems and assumptions. 1, It assumes that carbon based life is the only type of life that can form in our universe. 2, The terms“smaller” and “closer” are ambiguous. What is it meant by these? How small and how close? 3, It forgets the insane number of planets that exist. It's not that hard to think one day we will find a planet like ours. In fact, NASA has a mission called “Kepler”, which seeks to find Earth like planets. January 7th of 2013 NASA said “Since the last Kepler catalog was released in February 2012, the number of candidates discovered in the Kepler data has increased by 20 percent and now totals 2,740 potential planets orbiting 2,036 stars. The most dramatic increases are seen in the number of Earth-size and super Earth-size candidates discovered, which grew by 43 and 21 percent respectively.”[2] Kepler has also found a planet in a Habitable Zone, perfect for water. “NASA's Kepler mission has confirmed its first planet in the "habitable zone," the region where liquid water could exist on a planet’s surface” [3] Notice how the terms like “closer” and “smaller” undefined. Like the second fine tuned attribute. How far/close would it be for life to die out? “The habitable zone is the region around a star in which water will be liquid at the surface of a planet. The habitable zone around the Sun (depending on how you calculate it) is about 0.95 AU to 1.37 AU. An AU is the Earth's average distance from the Sun, 93 million miles, so the Earth's orbit could decrease by 4,500,000 miles or increase by 34,000,000 miles and still be in the habitable zone.”[4] Hardly fine tuned. It's obvious why the terms were undefined. Rare liquid argument Con claims that liquid is the rarest form of matter in the universe. This is uncited, because it's false. Hydrogen is the most common chemical in the universe and Oxygen is the third [5]. We all know what happens when we put those together! Con claims it's too unreasonable and unlikely to think liquid formed in the Big Bang. Contrary, evidence from the LHC shows the universe was “not only very hot and dense but behaved like a hot liquid.”[6]. Con also hasn't given the numbers, it's just his assertion. L.O.T. Argument Con says by the laws of Thermodynamics, another force must be active in the creation of the universe. There's a few fallacies here. First, it's an argument from ignorance, if we don't know how something came to be, this doesn't mean God did it. It's a causal proof by effect problem[7]. Con points to some effects and says God is the cause. Con has yet to prove this! Second, it's also a special pleading fallacy. If I ask where God came from, you would state God is outside the universe and needs no cause. If you grant something can exist without a cause and outside the universe, then why not something other than God? Under the mainstream interpretations of quantum physics, quantum vacuum fluctuations have no cause. They in a sense, bypass the laws of thermodynamics. [8][9] But that just raises the question of where the energy came from.Keep in mind E=mc^2 shows energy and matter are basically one in the same, they can transform into each other The answer is that the total energy of the universe is exactly zero. The matter in the universe is made out of positive energy. However, the matter is all attracting itself by gravity. Two pieces of matter that are close to each other have less energy than the same two pieces a long way apart, because you have to expend energy to separate them against the gravitational force that is pulling them together. Thus, in a sense, the gravitational field has negative energy. In the case of a universe that is approximately uniform in space, one can show that this negative gravitational energy exactly cancels the positive energy represented by the matter. So the total energy of the universe is zero.[10] Edward Tryon said The laws of physics place no limit on the scale of vacuum fluctuations. The duration is of course subject to the restriction ΔEΔt ~ h, but this merely implies that our Universe has zero energy, which has already been made plausible.[11] Tryon's model is falsified, but he set the stage. There's newer updated models that use the same foundations as Tryon. Like Alexander Vilenkin's quantum tunneling model. His model states the universe came from an uncaused quantum tunneling event. [12] Why should we accept God over the scientific alternatives? There's no reason to assume God when talking about the creation of the universe. The resolution is affirmed Back to Con Sources _____________________________________________________________________________ [1] http://www.merriam-webster.com... [2] http://www.nasa.gov... [3] http://www.nasa.gov... [4] http://curious.astro.cornell.edu... [5] http://www.einfopedia.com... [6] http://phys.org... [7] http://doubtingdave.com... [8] “In the everyday world, energy is always unalterably fixed; the law of energy conservation is a cornerstone of classical physics. But in the quantum microworld, energy can appear and disappear out of nowhere in a spontaneous and unpredictable fashion.” Davies, Paul. 1983. God and the New Physics. [9] “Even in a perfect vacuum—a region of space containing neither matter nor energy—particle-antiparticle pairs constantly appear and disappear....” https://www.cfa.harvard.edu... [10] Hawking, Steven. 1988. A Brief History of Time [11] Tryon, Edward P. 1973. Is the universe a vacuum fluctuation? [12] http://www.mukto-mona.com...