Rob,
You start by taking my analogy of programming a sim, a little too far.
Rob - "Well let's just conclude that there are infinite creators."
- You have not demonstrated that in order to have one creator you necessarily need an infinite number. You conclude nothing.
Rob - "EVERYTHING and I MEAN EVERYTHING has SOME KIND of explanation."
- This is a kind of reverse use of the flawed 'first cause' proof for God's existence.
I would say that we just do not have sufficient capability or capacity to understand either eternity or infinity. If a creator was the first cause, then we can know nothing about what exists on the other side of the Big Bang, except by a creator (if there is one), revealing it. To force eternity and creator into our logical straight-jacket and assert that a creator must have been created is flawed thinking - and is simply a false application of our understanding of the laws of this universe, (being the only laws that we can conceive of).
You simply cannot state that a creator just can't exist, without a start and end. As I have written before, the Biblical God says of himself, 'I AM'. This is communicating the atemporal status of 'simply existing' and in this instance is to be contrasted against the idea of 'I WAS' or 'I WILL BE'.
Linear progression as we understand it does not come into the equation.
Now I am not a savage, who believes that thunder is the gods shouting. Of course my emotions rail against the concept of something that 'just exists' and follows no arrow of time, (although there are quantum particles that appear to do just that). It is an utter nonsense to me, and an affront to everything I perceive. And on the basis of this alone, I would completely dispense with any idea of God. But I accept the historical evidence for Christ's divinity, I find his character and teachings to be completely compelling, and his understanding of the human condition without parallel - and I answer his question 'Who do you say I am?' with 'I say you are the 'I AM'.
This is coupled with my incredible experience of life as a Christian.
So my emotional struggle to accept ideas of eternity, omniscience, omnipresence and a created universe must be made subject to my solid (though subjective) experience, fused with good historical evidence that Christ was more than a carpenter
So I don't want to appear arrogant, and I will not say that there is not the smallest possibility that I am mistaken and self deceived - I just strongly believe that is not the case.
So I do not comply. But neither do I expect you to comply with what I say. I would however, like you to admit that I am not an unthinking fool, as DA Morgan claims, and you have also implied of anyone who holds a view other than a strictly empirical one. I won't expect it though and I won't press you
Regards,
Blacknad.
