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In order to avoid going around in circles, I think we need to focus more on specific theology (such as Old Testament literature / scripture demanding your acceptance that refraction only happened post-Noah, after the deity in question produced rainbows as a “pact”) rather than aimlessly wandering around the fog of Deism with tuned biases to make specific religions seem compatible with the unanswered questions. This will be far more productive than switching between Deism / agnosticism and mainstream religion to avoid such queries. If an insult is taken, then that’s a pity, because such beliefs are what the scriptures demand of the believer. Energy and effort would be better spent in addressing these specifics, in preference to taking offense.

A comment I read earlier might serve as a good focus:

“In order to create cells and the universe, your god must be pretty complex as well. Who created your god? Should I just believe something as complex as your god just came out of nowhere? Was he always around? If that is the case, let’s just skip a stage and say the universe was always around.”

Enjoy!

Thanks for your reply.

I think from your posts that you have a quite limited view of what Jews and Christians in particular *must believe*, most specifically concerning the Bible and science.

I don’t share that view, though I used to. It might help if you considered that there are physicists and astronomers who are also priests. They are not bible-thumpers, literalists, bibliolaters, etc.

Now I also see the corollary among *some* scientists. They adhere to the debunked philosophy of scientism, it’s a form of philosophical and religious ignorance. I don’t expect them to know this area, it’s outside their field; however, when they pontificate on it, the ignorance shows.

The corollary is that scientist can be as ignorant in metaphysics as various religious are about science. The conflict between the two, when it occurs, is, IMHO, due to ignorance, rarely malice.

>>>”Who created your god?”

Since we do not a theological framework for discussion, I’m using reason, in particular the first cause argument (with the caveat of you don’t have to call the first cause “God.”) And in this argument, the answer is, you guessed it:

The first cause is uncaused, for the reasons stated in the argument.