[part 2]

> You don't have a definition for physical? You don't think there is a distinction, or do you lack reason to think there is a distinction? For the criterion that I did give what was deficient? (you said that I didn't but I did: to be physical is to be able to have measurable effects or to be measurably affected)

I have never heard a coherent explanation of what the distinction would be.

Yes, you said that to be physical is to be able to have measurable effect [...], but then denied that the measurable effects of the potential of the universe to change state (namely, the measured change in state) implies that the potential of the universe to change state is physical, while you also say that the same kind of measurement when applied to the effects of charged particles implies that electrons are physical ... so, it's completely incoherent. You have not specified any method that I (or you) could apply to an arbitrary object to classify it as either physical or non-physical, you have just given vague criteria that can be interpreted any way you like and then simply asserted that the potential of the universe to change state is non-physical while electrons are physical.

> Another rephrase: It is immoral to do (A: X while thinking X is immoral) even if (B: X is moral). You'll be better off doing (C: any X while thinking X is moral) even if (D: X is immoral).

So, it is, under certain circumstances, immoral to do what is moral?

Could you explain in what way something could be meaningfully moral that does not mean that doing it is moral? Like, how could a sentence of the form "X is moral" possibly mean anything other than "doing X is moral"?

You could just as well be saying "It tastes bad to eat what you don't like even if it tastes good" ... as if there is any essence to "tasting good" that is independent from someone eating the thing. All it means for something to "taste good" is that someone likes to eat it, and if you don't like to eat it, then it doesn't taste good, and the same thing rather obviously seems to apply to "being moral" and "doing".

> Regarding A and B: A is immoral, even though B says X of A might be moral. It is not doing X that is immoral, it is doing A.

That doesn't resolve the contradiction. All you are saying here is that (A) whether X is moral depends on one's personal opinion and (B) that whether X is moral is objectively defined. You maybe should decide for one of those. Either it's defined by one's personal opinion, then there is no objective definition, or there is an objective definition, then it's not defined by one's personal opinion. Both at the same time doesn't work.

> What is my method, and what is problematic with it?

What I meant was: The primary problem is not that you are saying that acting according to god's will will maximize your well-being (or whatever the exact claim was, I might be butchering it somewhat), the problem is (probably) how you come to that conclusion. Now, I am making some assumptions based on how theists generally justify their position, and it is possible, though somewhat unlikely, that you have a completely different justification. But in any case, the important question is whether your justification is sufficient, not whether the claim is false.

> If, for my demonstration, I were to refer to the lives of the saints, they being better at achieving their goals of happiness than anyone else whom does not employ their methods by far, how might you object then?

1. You couldn't have picked a more biased example. If I were to show you that there exist millionaires who got rich with day trading, would you consider that evidence that day trading generally makes people rich? If you want to figure out whether some method reliably gives a particular result, you have to look at all people who have attempted the method, not just those who are known for having ended up with a good result. Even terrible methods usually will not prevent all good outcomes.

2. That is an extremely limited perspective on happiness. To take a somewhat random example, one big contribution to lack of happiness in the world are diseases. The saints most certainly were not exceptionally good at either helping to cure or manage diseases in general, nor at avoiding getting ill. That doesn't take away from the forms of happiness they might have been able to achieve (not that I am all that familiar with the lives of Catholic saints), but it's not at all obvious that they were particularly good at achieving overall-happiness, nor that their goals were indeed limited to those particular kinds of happiness, and they didn't mind getting ill, for example.

If you want to figure out which of any competing methods for achieving a goal is better at doing so, you have to compare scenarios that actually use different methods. A saint who makes all decisions based on what they believe to be divine revelation, say, but who lives in a secular society where all other decisions are made based on scientific ideas, is not in fact using only divine revelation to achieve happiness, but possibly simply benefits from all the discoveries made by people using scientific decisionmaking for increased happiness, with possibly some comparably minor additional improvement due to their god belief, or whatever. If you wanted to compare methods, you would have to compare scenarios where either only one or only the other method is being used, or you risk misattributing results.