You're telling me to "just stop"? Even this is a straw man wrapped in a red herring. You're free to stop with the logical fallacies at any time now.Maybe the fact that I haven't even said I'm certain there *is* an argument to be made? If I'm not even sure the argument can be made, then I certainly haven't made that argument. If I haven't made the argument, it is impossible to have begged the question. In fact, the three traits I brought up in the OP have never even been describded by me as being the premise. Certainly they would inform a premise, but I haven't even formulated one yet. If I haven't formulated a premise, then you certainly don't know what the premise is while asserting that I have begged the question.
Just stop.
Pay attention to what you wrote:
"Right now, I can only say I have an intuitive sense that the argument can be made; but, I haven't nailed it down. The basic idea is that these three observations of our own experience in the world ought to lead us to an acknowledgement of God -- not to a full-blown Christian theology, but at least to a basic theistic position."
Pay attention to what I wrote earlier:
""Even if you are able to reframe #3 into something palatable, your underlying premise is logically fallacious in that it assumes the conclusion. In other words, only those who believe that those "three observations" reasonably lead to "an acknowledge of God" will be lead to an acknowledgement of God. It's a non-starter."
"You stated the "basic idea" which is the "underlying premise".
Note that I did not say that your "argument" is logically fallacious. I said your "underlying premise". Yes Virginia, an underlying premise can beg the question.
Are you asserting that, for all intents and purposes, a "basic idea" is not the same as an "underlying premise"?
You clearly haven't thought through much of anything. You can start any time now.
Once again:
"Why don't you set your pride aside and admit that the reason that you've "been stewing on [your argument] for years" and haven't been able to "get it worked out" is because the underlying premise is hopelessly flawed?"
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