Evidence for creation discussed

You are suggesting faith is without reasoning?

I think it's pretty clear what I'm saying. (See my 2 posts prior to the "summary")

No, make up your mind if you see a difference between faith and reasoning, explain yourself. If you cannot reason out something to trust it, what is it you are doing? Faith in anything is a level of trust, you think when someone says faith that automatically means blind faith? 

I don't know how to be any clearer. Perhaps @stephen_33 can "translate" the point of my posts #177 & 178 to you, regarding the inconsistency of your appealing to "reason" and "evidence" to try to convince others of the truth of your position, but then questioning the value of reason and evidence when others try to use it to support their position. Apparently you don't see how this undermines the original goal of your OP to provide "Evidence for creation."

Undermind my position on evidence for creation, the original post here was May 2021 you said you were going to watch the whole thing, did you? It is all about evidence, the whole point is evidence and low and behold, not discussed, and Stephen doesn't want to watch it, if evidence were a concern this would have been the thread to pay attention to. Instead, 20 rounds of what the word faith means with respect to reason. Yeah, point taken, what point!?

See, you don't listen. I already told you I watched the whole video pages ago. I even commented on it. I even summarized the video for @stephen_33. I even posted screenshots of the speaker's main points from the video pages ago. I just reposted some of those same screenshots from the video on the page before and just gave a link to the post #177 on this page above (It makes me wonder if you watched your own video!). And how can you complain about posts on the relationship of faith vs. reason when you're the one who started that conversation?

And how after all this do you still keep missing my fundamental point???

Well, apologies for missing you saying you watched it, my bad. I don't see the difference between reasoning something out then trusting it, we have to trust what it is we are doing is actually doing what we believe it is. Which was his point!

That may be Chesterton's point, but it seems to serve no point with respect to the point of your OP. Not sure why you included it here. Maybe you should have started a separate OP on it

Regarding my point: let's try a different tack, using the "God's crime scene" video you posted. 

In the video he starts off by comparing the issue to forensics investigation determination of whether the crime scene is explained by "inside" or "outside the box."

If all the evidence can be explained by what's "inside the box," then it wasn't a murder. If the evidence requires us to look "outside the box," then we're dealing with an intruder.

He applies the same analogy to the universe and lists eight evidences that he says require an explanation "outside the box," that is "outside" the universe.

So, even though no one was present to witness the origin of the universe, he is arguing that we can still infer on the basis of existing evidence that a creator must still be behind it all. His argument from inference is similar to what is done in forensic science where it doesn't matter if no one was there to witness an event: clues and evidence left over from the event can still be used to reconstruct the event and infer what happened. 

***My question to you is do you find his reasoning and inference to a Designer valid and convincing?

Yes, there are brain cells firing off in my head going, yes, I remember that. Sorry!

Yes, I do find it convincing. As I have stated when it comes to the design of specific complex functions, I find it laughable that someone could look at that and think mindlessness.

Maybe for some people, but not everyone. Antony Flew, for one, would disagree. 

There are a number of phenomena that seem to presuppose the existence of an infinite, eternal, intelligent Mind in order to account for the reality of such phenomena; namely, phenomena like the nonphysical realities of rationality, autonomous goal-seeking life, consciousness, rational & conceptual thought, subjective thought, abstract formalisms and symbol-based codes & languages, 'self,' and the like. 

Now I get that you do not find such things sufficiently convincing to conclude 'God,' but surely you can see how others could reason to such a conclusion, even if you disagree with it yourself. 'God' is not some pulled-out-of-thin-air idea, nor ad hoc hypothesis, nor god-of-the-gaps 'answer' or argument from ignorance to explain what we don't know, but is a natural inference to draw from nonphysical realities and phenomena we do know and that undeniably do exist.

***This line of reasoning is succinctly stated by @TruthMuse's oft repeated 'Mind or mindless process' argument.

It is not an empty, vacuous point: it is difficult to see how 'mindless' matter can give rise to 'mind,' consciousness, autonomous goal seeking 'self' behavior, nonphysical symbol-based codes, languages, rationality and conceptual thought, and the like.

Now again, you may find such lines of reasoning ultimately unconvincing, but to say there are no reasons at all for concluding 'God' would seem to go too far.

And I find such reasoning and inferences from evidence to be a valid form of reasoning, too, even if no one was present to observe it, because we still have the clues and evidence left over that are still available to us today that we can reconstruct and draw logical inferences from like forensic scientists do, even though no one was present to witness the crime.

*MY point* is that scientific fields like cosmology and paleontology do the exact same thing as forensic science. They can logically reconstruct and infer conclusions on the basis of clues and evidence that still exist today, even though no one was present.

*MY point* is that it inconsistent to accept such reasoning as valid for inferring a creator of the universe that no one was around to see, but reject it when the same type of reasoning is used in cosmology and paleontology. 

That is special pleading.

That may well be the case but as someone who greatly trusts the scientific method I feel I can do no other: I'm not a trained scientist, so I have to defer to those who are.

Anyway, if we were to accept that life could not have arisen as the result of a natural process where would that take us other than up a dead end? What could be inferred other than that some creative agent had brought life into existence and then seemingly withdrawn, allowing evolution to take its course?

Allow me to pose some obvious objections which you've skipped over?

Some 3500,000,000 years ago life emerged on our planet. Did life possess " 'mind,' consciousness, autonomous goal seeking 'self' behavior, nonphysical symbol-based codes, languages, rationality and conceptual thought, and the like" at that stage?

Most certainly not!

Skip on a mere 2500,000,000 years and the first multi-celled life emerges. Did any such lifeform possess the qualities you refer to? Most emphatically not.

Skip on another 400,000,000 years until creatures with skeletons come into existence - any evidence of " 'mind,' consciousness, autonomous goal seeking 'self' behavior, nonphysical symbol-based codes, languages, rationality and conceptual thought, and the like" yet?

Sorry but no.

Skip on another 580,000,000 years and finally we arrive at what might be called the 'age of the mammals'. Only then can we start to talk in terms of creatures that might possess what we understand to be nascent consciousness.

And of course we still have to move on another 20,000,000 years or so before we encounter an upright ape-like creature that at last enables us to say consciousness has arrived!

It's all very well pointing at our own species and asking how could something so bizarre emerge by any natural process but it's vitally important to consider the question in the context of evolution.

And I must ask people to avoid the use of the term 'God' in the context of this discussion because there's no demonstrable connection between a proposed creator of the first life on Earth and the entity of popular religion.

'Creator' or 'Agent' is fine but 'God' implies an agenda - that's starting with a conclusion ('the god of my religion is real) and working back to make any evidence fit the proposition.

The point is your statement is not just an appeal to authority--which is not necessarily bad when it's supported--but an appeal to authority that is not authoritative 

I've been saying mindlessness and agency for the most part but will answer any question related to God, but like every proposition, there needs to be evidence for it, and mindlessness, some the proof of that is? Even your examples, I can accept as evidence for you, but seeing a consistent change in processes without a process breaking down is NOT evidence for mindlessness. Still, to change over time, and to continually improve is not a mindless process taking place, instead, it shows something involved in seeing it through constantly, life does not appear to be left to run on itself without interference using your examples.

First, I was just following your lead, which put 'God' in quotation marks. Second, I disagree. One need merely specify and expound on the meaning of the word 'God,' which you and I have already seen philosophers define in a rigorous way--even if you reject the existence of such a being. Philosopher David Conway's book, for example:

There are many, many multi volume tomes on the subject in academic philosophy. When I use the term here I am referring to the Aristotltelian conception that share numerous attributes in common with the God of Judeo-Christian tradition.