Three best arguments: answering Skeptical

I.Fine Trining. Skeptical argues:

- How is order an indication of God? Order occurs spontaneously. You would need to argue that order can only happen as a result of a conscious mind. But we know that's not true. The "laws of physics" are the product of human minds observing and abstracting the behavior of physical things, but they don't govern that behavior.

First of all, the fine tuning argument does not say order implies God. It does not turn on order. I have no idea where he got that.It's about the specific combination of factors that allow for life to develop that is not the same as infuring God from order in the universe.

Secondly,when he asserts that major structures in the universe,such as natural law, do not require mind or ordering he's begging the question. He's assuming his position as a guide to settle the argument. -

And the universe is not fine-tuned for life. Rather, life is fine-tuned by evolution to exist in its environment. If your assertion were true, we should expect to find more of it, everywhere we look.

   That doesn't follow,"life is fine tuned by evolution..." means nothing, come on what does it mean? Saying that the universe is fine tuned means circumstances are arranged such that life can develop. What does it mean to say life is fine tuned by evolution and why is that not the same as saying the universe is fine tuned to produce life?

 

 But as far as we know life doesn't exist in most parts of the universe. Our planet is one place out of many that is an exception, because it happens to be conducive to life.

Fine tuning would mean small adjustments not sweeping change. So a fine tuned universe would be very similar in many respects to a non life bearing universe. So what does that do to the argument, to say Earth is a little corner where life is possible? So what? Then he harps on my major source of information: -

...Paul Davies is paid to put a religious spin on science, making it sound as if his religious views were legitimate scientific conclusions, which they are not. Nagel, too, is a religious-leaning philosopher who makes his living peddling religious ideas to a religious audience. You can't put much stock in these guys as sources of unbiased information.

Notice he doesn't document anything. Who is paying him and why? My disposition is that Skepie is assuming the Templeton prize is payment, Davies is a highly respected scientist who teaches at Arizona State and other places: He was a popular atheist apologist. Ye already won the Templeton prize so the money is his He doesn't have to earn it.

Paul Davies is a theoretical physicist, cosmologist, astrobiologist and best-selling science author. He has published about 30 books and hundreds of research papers and review articles across a range of scientific fields...Among his many awards are the 1995 Templeton Prize, the Faraday Prize from The Royal Society, the Kelvin Medal and Prize from the Institute of Physics, the Robinson Cosmology Prize and the Bicentenary Medal of Chile. He was made a member of the Order of Australia in the 2007 Queen's birthday honours list and the asteroid 6870 Pauldavies is named after him. This is all courtesy of that highly biased religious source Arizona State University.[1]

The idea that he's being paid to make pro religious arguments is ludicrous.

  II.The religious experience argument:

Skep says: "Religious or mystical experience is a natural function of the human brain. It occurs with a broad range of intensities and associated mental imagery." Actually, mystical experience is supposed to be beyond images so that statement is a direct contradiction to any real knowledge of the subject.

He then demonstrates the poor state of his knowledge of Hood's work. "Ralph Hood can try to categorize it as 'legitimate' or not, but his position would be challenged by millions of people who have had these kinds of experiences induced by means other than what Hood would allow." What he means by this is a real puzzle. Where does Hood say anything about what means mystical union is allowed? Clearly he has never read Hood and pieced together his own version of what Hood probably says being a fundamentalist christian. But Hood is not a Christian of any sort.Skeptical does not know the basics of his work. Hood has devised a means of controlling for a true mystical experience based upon British philosopher W.T. Stace who studied the great mystics of the world. He says nothing about disalloying meaning or obtaining the state.

Skeptical says:

In many cultures, they use drugs to induce it, but Hood can't tell them that their experience is not legitimate. In our own culture, churches use psychological manipulation to induce religious experiences. The fact is that mystical experience is pretty easy to trigger, either in your own mind, or in someone else's. There is zero real scientific evidence that God is behind it.

Drugs do not induce mystical consciousness, I talk about this in detail in my book.[2] His argument is begging the question. Hood's M scale is validated as a means of determining if one has actually had the kind of experiences the mystics of the world have called "mystical union." Why would people who really have the experience express indignation at Hoods work when he's merely showing them they have it? Fir those who have not really had it shouldn't they face the truth? Skep has no evidence that there would be a conflagration.

...

- "You might want to claim that atheists are threatened by science that supports a religious conclusion, but you would be wrong. Just show us legitimate science to support your religious conclusions." Obviously they are. I have shown legitimate science that supports my view, the work of Ralph Hood.

Despite the fact that you have written a book, we are still waiting. If your conclusions were valid, it would certainly draw attention, but that book hasn't made even a tiny ripple in the scientific community.

That's a really childish understanding of the way academic publishing works. I don't have a big publishing company behind me and this was my first book, I am not in the PhD club.Here is Randel Rouser's interview with me on that book. Also reviewed by Lantz Miller is an academic journal.that's not bad for a first effort.[3]My life is a failure in that I did not achieve any of the goals I set for myself. God wont see me that way because I led people to him, One soul snatched from the jaws of hell matters more than the Nobel  prize.

III.Laws of nature.

   He omitted the title hoping to confuse this with argument I. That's clear from the point below:"How is this argument distinct from the first one?"

  - "mind is the most efficient and dependable source of ordering we know". That's pure hogwash. Order occurs as a result of thermodynamics, in scales ranging from subatomic to stellar. And there is no valid reason to think that there must be a mind behind it. Simple observation provides prima facie evidence that order is spontaneous.
 
I talk about the most efficient source of ording he asserts any king of ordering means we don't need to think about that, He's just ignoring the issue I raise and putting in own straw man. He clearly confused this with a design argument. He asks "How is this argument distinct from the first one?" Argument I is fine tuning it asserts that success inproduciglife implsy devine hel since life is so improbable. This argument asserts the mind is implied in order. Clearly not the same even though they use similar ideas.
 
 
[1] Arizona State University, "Paul Davies Regents Professor (FSC), Department of Physics Regents Professor (FSC), The Beyond Center."  no Date given.https://search.asu.edu/profile/979476
 
[2] Joseph Hinman, The Trace of God, A Rational Warrant for Belief. Grand viaduct, 2014,61, 296,    
 
[3] Searching ffir God In Mystical Experience, An Interview with Joseph Hinman, January 8, 2019 by Randal Rauser.https://randalrauser.com/2019/01/searching-for-god-in-mystical-experience-an-interview-with-joseph-hinman/
Review by Lantz Miller,https://philarchive.org/rec/MILROT-11    

 
Joe HinmanPhone: 469-601-7946Website: The Religious A PrioriBlog: Metacrock's Blog My book, The