And lo and behold, the newcomer jumps to unwarranted conclusions. How often have we seen this here before?
Those of us who paid attention in class, apply rigour to our thinking. None of us who treat the issues seriously, either assume or assert that there does not exist a “creator”, whatever form such an entity may take. That last bolded part was chosen with care, for reasons that shall become apparent in due course, but for now, let us concentrate upon the assertion that a god type entity of some sort exists.
Quite simply, the question of whether of not a god type entity in the most general sense exists, is an unanswered question. We know this, because if a proper, rigorous answer had been found at some point in the past, that answer would now be part of our mainstream body of knowledge, and no sensible person would be arguing about this. That such an answer has not materialised, means that this assertion us unsupported by evidence, and as a corollary, like every other unsupported assertion, can be safely discarded, with the proviso of course that we should be willing to change our minds, the moment we alight upon data informing us that this course of action is required.
The trouble is, mythology fanboys never apply rigour to their thinking. Instead, they think that their choice of cartoon magic man, from their choice of pre-scientific mythology, is the only viable option, and do so on the flimsy basis known as “my favourite mythology says so”. This is usually followed by the concoction of duplicitous ex recto apologetic fabrications, aimed at trying to twist observational data to conform to mythological assertions, regardless of how much said data destroys said mythological assertions.
Worse still, mythology fanboys treat uncritically as fact, the assertions of their favourite mythologies, even when said assertions are known not merely to be wrong, but fatuous and absurd. A hilarious example is provided by the assertion in Genesis, that genetics is purportedly controlled by coloured sticks, an assertion that was found to be risibly false by a 19th century monk, whole landmark scientific research not only taught us how genetics actually operates, but launched modern genetics as a properly constituted scientific discipline.
Indeed, that example also has lethal ramifications for the assertion that the cartoon magic man in question is purportedly “omniscient”, and purported possesses perfect foreknowledge of the future. Which fails dismally when one compares that mythological assertion about genetics, to what we actually learned about the subject once scientific enquiry was undertaken on a proper, diligent basis. Apparently the cartoon magic man in question was insufficiently “omnisicent”, to foresee the emergence of that 19th century monk and his diligent scientific experiments.
Examples such as this lead those of us who paid attention in class, to treat religious mythologies with proper suspicion. And, indeed, we come at this point to the genuine view that many of us here hold, namely that cartoon magic men from pre-scientific mythologies can be dismissed with little effort, on the basis that said entitles are constructed within the requisite mythologies to possess contradictory and absurd properties, even before we question the provenance of the mythologies on the basis of the demonstrable errors contained therein.
Furthermore, some of us have entertained ideas on this matter, that mythology fanboys are clearly incapable of even fantasising about, just as the original authors of the myuthologies in question were incapable of even fantasising about vast classes of entities and interactions subsequently alighted upon by scientists. As an example, after reviewing two peer reviewed scientific papers on the subject of cosmological physics, I posted this substantial thread involving multiple posts, explaining how the requisite work in cosmological physics has serious (and at times hilarious) ramifications for assertions about a “creator”. Before you jump to yet more unwarranted conclusions, read carefully the posts in question, including the parts where I cover in some detail that the scientific papers in question include a testable prediction, something completely absent from mythology fanboy apologetics.
So already, there’s a substantial body of prior art present on this forum, which you never bothered to search for, and whose existence remained unknown to you at the time of your post. But we’re used to seeing this absence of diligence on the part of mythology fanboys.
Moving on …
This is diametrically opposed to how proper discourse operates.
In the realm of proper discourse, whoever presents an assertion is required to support that assertion. If someone asserts that a fantastic magic entity exists that was purportedly responsible for fabricating the observable universe and its contents, it is that someone who is required to support that assertion. All the rest of us have to do, is sit back and wait for success or failure on the part of that someone to support that assertion - or indeed any other assertion presented. If that someone fails to support the assertion being presented, then said assertion is safely discardable.
The proper discoursive action, if one wishes to have an assertion treated as fact, is to support that assertion with genuine evidence. Without which, that assertion can be tossed into the bin without further ado. This is why rigorous human endeavours involve the business of testing assertions, to determine whether or not they are true or false. In the absence of said testing, every assertion presented that is bereft of said testing forever remains in the epistemological limbo known as “truth value unknown”, and is therefore useless as a means of establishing knowledge.
Once said testing has been conducted, however, two corollaries follow. An assertion found to be false can again be discarded, except for pedagogical purposes - namely, learning how we made mistakes in the past, and what steps need to be taken to avoid such errors in the future. An assertion found to be true is transformed into an evidentially supported postulate, and becomes a part of our mainstream body of knowledge.
Indeed, a direct rebuttal to your error is provided by the aphorism “it is the mark of an educated mind to entertain a thought without accepting it”, which indeed is the basis of every rigorous academic discipline. Now it so happens that this aphorism is mistaken attributed to Aristotle, and there exists a suitably succinct explanation (along with a direct quotation in the original Greek, of the requisite passage from the Nicomachean Ethics) covered here.
A relevant reply to that blog post is this one, from which we learn:
However, even if we take on board that error and learn from it, it still remains a fact, that in proper discourse, propositions only have a well-defined truth-value when they have been properly tested to determine said truth-value, which anyone familiar with the work of Willard Van Ormand Quine will recognise as the fundamental principle of applied logic. A principle mythology fanboys have a habit of ignoring (sometimes deliberately) when they peddle their vacuous and frequently duplicitous apologetics.
I think this should cover the relevant bases.