You’re missing the mark here. We both understand that we are backed up against a mystery. And we both are claiming that the mystery is not contingent, but necessary.
But the universe ISN'T necessary. That is the point. The universe exhibits CHANGE. That means the universe, by definition, is contingent; that is, is not self existent. It requires an explanation.
God does not require an explanation becasue God is not contingent; that is, God is unchanging. God's very nature precludes an explanation. The nature of the universe REQUIRES one.
See the point? We are talking of the very NATURE of things. That is what makes them different. God is UNCREATED. In your image of God, you are assuming that God is PART of the created sphere, in which case, God requires an explanation, like everything else in creation.
You are assuming that God isn't set apart from His creation, something fundamentally different in kind from creation. You assume in your image of God, that God is
"out there" and that Christians should be able tp
"produce" Him like any other created thing. That maybe if we had a powerful enough telescope we could
"see" where God is, where heaven is. That is just the point: they ARE NOT here. They are OUTSIDE of the universe.
What is provisional is what the nature of that non-contingent reality is. You have a religious assertions that describes it in very rote fashion even though time and experience has ripped large holes in that rather rote description.
How so?
We have provisional assertions that go where the evidence of our shared reality lead us.
Why is it that scientists look at the evidence differently? One scientist--will, as a result of their studies become a Christian, or some kind of theist. Other scientists will look at the exact same evidence and either remain atheist, or leave theism. Evidence is evidence. Data is data. Why do different scientists come to such different conclusions?
Yes, that is the claim. But that claim competes with so many other supernatural traditions rendering it as mundane as any other in the realm of competing religious claims.
There are competing scientific claims as well. Does this disprove the validity to the scientific method? Does this disprove that there are scientific laws that can be known and understood?
Competing religious traditions and viewpoints no more disprove the existence of God than competing scientific claims disprove "The Science."
So one such credible refutation of the apostolic claims would entail 4 things. 1. The lack of witness by actual biblical authors (hearsay).
The apostles or their scribes wrote the NT. The apostles all witnessed the appearances of Jesus. All of the Gospels were written within the lifetime of the apostles--even IF you go with the liberal dating of the Gospels and books of the NT.
2. The lack of any extra biblical claims to any remarkable event in Judea from the birth of Jesus to his resurrection. Josephus. Tacitus, Suetonius, Pliny, et al... would surely have been privy to the stories of remarkable goings on beyond just acknowledging Christians existed.
You just asserted previously that there were no direct eye witnesses to the Resurrection, which calls into question its credibility. Now you complain that non-eyewitnesses never mentioned it, thus calling into question its credibility?
You given me an impossible burden of proof! I produce eyewitnesses in the form of the apostles who saw Jesus, and then wrote about it in the NT. You tell me--"
Well, shucks, you know? I mean gosh. How can we possibly trust those accounts?" Then you turn around and claim that
"Well, shucks, you know? I mean gosh. If the Resurrection happened, we should expect to see non-eyewitnesses writing about it."
See my point? The secular historians you mentioned didn't witness the Resurrection. they did not witness Christ. Why would we expect them to write about it? The fact that they aren't eyewitnesses would tend to invalidate their credibility by your own standard of proof. You mean to tell me that if the DID write about it, you would go
"Well, shucks! You got me! I guess the resurrection really happened!" Of course you wouldn't. You would invalidate their testimony since they weren't eyewitnesses.
The question is: WHY should we not treat the Gospels as historical documents? One need not suppose they are Scripture in order to examine them as historical documents.
3. The competitive supernatural escalation required to keep an already superstitious and illiterate people engaged.
Here you go. This is the quintessential example of modern, Western arrogance.
"We are so smart, enlightened. and scientific. No one before us knew anything, they were stupid. They were predisposed to believe anything becasue they didn't have 'The Science' like we do today. Thus, it would make perfect sense for them to believe it when someone said 'Hey guys, I was dead but I came back to life.'"
You might want to try reading the Gospels some time. Jesus disciples were NOT AT ALL predisposed to believe in anything he said. They are presented as bumbling idiots who do not believe what he says, don't understand it, and then when he needed them the most, ran out on him. When they heard initial reports of the Resurrection, they discounted them, believing instead that someone stole the body. Even AFTER they encounter Him in His resurrected body, they still do not believe. It isn't until he ascends to heaven and the Spirit comes on the Church that they believe, understand, and boldly preach.
You seriously want to maintain that you need to have "PhD" "MD" or "DO" after your name, you need to be "The Fauci" who is "The Science" to know that people don't come back from the dead? The apostles were so stupid, they didn't understand what death was? They understood it well--which is why after Jesus was crucified, they were in hiding, expecting the same fate to befall them.
and 4. The world we experience just just doesn’t work that way and there is no reason at all that the remarkable works of god claimed to be happening then should have suddenly ceased. The world of that area and era did not change much... except for one thing... literacy. Literacy is killing the Christian assertion.
Actually.....the works continue in the person of the Church He founded. The Church continues to cast out demons, preach the Good News, and there are even miracles from time to time. But of course, even when "The Science" cannot explain this, the atheist still maintains that--well-it just has to be false, you know? Just becasue "The Science" doesn't have the answers now, it will eventually get them. And then your superstition will be disproven. Quite frankly, some of the explanations atheists come up with for Near Death Experiences, the Shroud of Turin, Eucharistic miracles, expulsion of demons, etc, require MORE Faith, than simply accepting the miraculous.
It is a black swan fallacy, I’ll admit. But as another poster related to you, we can alter brain biology and thus alter what you claim to be a duality of mind. So we see that your dual nature mind/brain paradigm is suffering scientific literacy as well as Thor’s Thunder Hammer did.
I will have to look in to that more. Ed Feser, a professor of philosophy wrote a book about the mind where he addresses some of these assertions and explains why they don't prove what the scientists think they prove-this--if I understand what you are referring to correctly. I started reading it, but it was over my head.
That is a different issue than whether the god you imagine exists. But that is another thread concerning human's pattern seeking brain.
You mean our need to find patterns where none exists, so the brain just invents them? That is true, but this doesn't disprove the existence of patterns!
I know... What is god? A willful sentient disembodied mind/being or a set of intrinsic properties of nature. Both can be non-contingent, but one has a better track record of aligning with experienced reality.
God is that which is purely actual. Everything in the universe is a combination of potentiality and actuality.
