Posted by Gremlin [12.255.181.7 - 12-255-181-7.client.attbi.com] on 12 July 2002 at 02.42.35 ZuluTime:
In Reply to: gloats for a moment on being right with one thing posted by Andy on 12 July 2002 at 02.25.08 ZuluTime:
Polypatrideism is certainly circular, but so is the argument that a deity must exist to explain the existence of the universe.
Whether a deity would have to exist outside the laws of physics isn't something I can confirm. Something Swyndle said once, which was pretty clever: if a deity exists outside of physics, and physics compose reality, then deities exist outside reality and therefore aren't real.
Anyway: your options were that A) the laws of physics are a deity, or B) a deity is a deity. And this is why you're wrong.
In an attempt to force the necessity of a deity somewhere in the structure of reality, you've arbitrarily decided that at least one must exist. We're to take it as read that a deity exists somewhere, and now we have to determine whether that deity is an organism or a set of rules. Which means that you're already wrong. We haven't seen any evidence that deities exist; we've only seen your arbitrary choice between the existing deity being physics or some sort of creature.
So here's the third option: there are laws to physics, and we break them all the time; we don't worship the laws of physics, the ghost of Darwin, or the Supreme High Autobot of Sirius. Things in the universe tend to follow a predictible set of rules, but break those rules on occasion. The laws of physics are not deities in any conventional definition.
I shouldn't have to point that out, but I've let it go in the past and run into theists accusing me of wosrhipping the real world instead of the bogeyman. So, as a precaution: no one of any measurable sanity considers physics to be deities.
Leaving the unfounded assertion that a different sort of deity exists outside the physical universe. If that's your essential assertion, we'll need evidence to support it before we can move on to its identity.
--Gremlin