Pray!

Hi again Nocredo,

You said,

This inference is the prosecutor’s fallacy. I mentioned it earlier because fine-tuning arguments tend to commit it…..So, you haven’t shown that a life-permitting universe is highly unlikely on atheism….

Its not “unlikely”. Its impossible.

Simple metaphor. Say that you walk on the beach and you see the words, “I love Lucy” written in the sand. Will you presume that the action of the waves has written this message in the sand? I wouldn’t. I would presume that some human had written that message.

Why? Because only humans can do intelligent tasks.

Now consider that even the simplest living organism has messages (i.e. codes) written into its dna which are thousands of times more complex than the simple three word sentence found in the sand.

It is impossible that any living thing came to be by mere chance.

Further, even if you did show that some generic life-permitting universe was more probable on theism than atheism and didn’t commit the prosecutor’s fallacy, the actual life-permitting universe we observe is less likely on theism than atheism. (e.g., billions of years of empty space, we may very well be the highest level of intelligence evolved, etc.) i.e., the argument would commit the fallacy of undetermined evidence.

Reasonableness is the test which should be applied. It is not reasonable that any living thing could come to being without being created by a Higher Power.

It takes more faith to be an atheist than it does to be a believer. You believe that highly intricate living things could make themselves or could be created by accident.

That is the biggest leap of faith of all.

Sincerely,

De Maria