Of course you’ve been given things to work with. Simply characterising them the way you do is a cop-out.

It's the most common understanding, and Cambridge dictionary, for example, defines it as everything that exists. — S

Looked it up:

everything that exists, especially all physical matter, including all the stars, planets, galaxies, etc. in space — Cambridge Dictionary

You're suggesting that we should make a special exception so that a word means something completely different just so you can avoid a contradiction in terms and make your argument which concludes that God exists. — S

Look. Here’s the first definition of “universe” from my Dictionary app: “the totality of known or supposed objects and phenomena throughout space”. This definition does not assume or preclude the existence or non-existence of God.

Here’s your definition: “everything”. This definition assumes there is no God (because God is necessarily beyond the universe), and also precludes the possibility that He exists. It is a question-begging definition, and not even in my dictionary app.

You're suggesting that we should make a special exception so that a word means something completely different just so you can avoid a contradiction in terms and make your argument which concludes that God exists. That's unreasonable and clearly driven by your motive. — S

I’m suggesting that you shouldn’t use a question-begging definition in your argument. It’s unreasonable and clearly driven by your motive.

If life is not an automatic good then you have to come up with a different argument against abortion. It is only an argument against one reason to oppose abortion. — Andrew4Handel

How about that life isn’t automatically bad?

Nevertheless the status of the fetus is not the same as the status of someone who is much older and where you are not talking about hypothetical outcomes. Adults can choose to kill themselves having decided whether or not life is desirable for them. Some people can see ways to improve their life. — Andrew4Handel

But as for unborn children, we’re allowed to decide for them?

Anyone that believes in a better afterlife has a problem justifying this quality of life. — Andrew4Handel

My understanding is that suffering in Christianity is intrinsically meaningless, and so can’t be used to justify ending a life. Our purpose is simply to live according to God’s will, happily or not.

I am not using the bible as an authority by any stretch of the imagination I am saying that Christians cannot coherently use the bible to justify an anti abortion stance. — Andrew4Handel

Can’t they? “Blessed are the gentle, for they shall inherit the earth.” Killing unborn children is in stark opposition to that, for a start.

A position which rejects a contradiction in terms is somehow less reasonable than a position which entertains and accepts it. Good argument.

What next? Square circles? — S

It’s only a contradiction in terms if you’re using your question-begging definition of the universe.

I agree. But it is an argument against the idea that killing a fetus prevents someone having a fulfilling life because a fulfilling is not guaranteed. It opposes the claim someone is always robbed of something good by dying. — Andrew4Handel

And this could be used as a justification for killing anyone you saw as living a sad life.

It is not a justification for killing someone it is pointing out that if you believe in heaven then killing someone is giving them a better life. Many Christians believe they are going onto something much better. And they and other religions value martyrdom also. — Andrew4Handel

Yeah, again, this is all justification for killing people, which is obviously not very Christian.

I think you could undermine any interpretation of the bible by referring to another one. — Andrew4Handel

Well that scuppers your Biblical argument then.

I don't think that killing is obviously wrong. — Andrew4Handel

Well if we all make ourselves Godless self-appointed gods about the matter then I think that will be problematic for wider society.

No. I quoted one translation of the bible you are quoting another. — Andrew4Handel

Your translation omitted an important line.

No because this only applies to children who are not at the age to be damned to hell. — Andrew4Handel

So it could be used to justify arbitrarily killing only holy people, then, which is also absurd.

I think from a non theological standpoint that creating a child creates far more suffering than terminating a pregnancy or being childless. From a theological standpoint it is hard to justify creating a child who will be sinful, experience evil and may be condemned to hell. — Andrew4Handel

This is an argument for not having children, not conceiving and then killing them.

Your first quote omits an important line:

If a man beget an hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also that he have no burial; I say, that an untimely birth is better than he. — Ecclesiastes 6.3

It’s also worth noting that the despairing nature of Ecclesiastes is a dissent from the rest of the Old Testament.

I think Christians and Jews have a problem when opposing abortion.
Because if a child dies then they will go straight to heaven and be better off and not be exposed to sin and suffering. — Andrew4Handel

By the same token you could justify arbitrarily murdering people, which would of course be absurd thing for a Christian or Jew to justify to themselves.

I was making the point that the “don’t like abortions, then don’t have one” argument is fatuous, even if you assert that it isn’t, because it doesn’t take seriously the moral issue that is the basis for opposing it.

Then I am missing something as well, because I don’t agree that an atheist is forced to think the Universe exists just because. Only the rationally deficient thinks a thing without a reason for it. — Mww

The reason is that on atheism there is nothing beyond the universe to account for its existence, so it has to account for itself, and for no reason.

Do you see that upon any examination by anybody on anything whatsoever, such examination automatically and necessarily subsumes its object under the concept of time?

“...intuitions without concepts are empty; concepts without intuitions are blind...” — Mww

Does it? God’s timelessness necessarily means he has no beginning, no end and does not change. By describing him this way God is not “subsumed under the concept of time”, and such a description seems perfectly intuitive to me.

If a person doesn't like terminating pregnancies, then they need merely either not get pregnant, and if they do, not have an abortion. Anything else is minding someone else's business. — tim wood

If a person doesn’t like murder, then they need merely either not murder, and if they do, own up to it. Anything else is minding someone else’s business.

Incorrect. — S

Oh right, sorry, didn’t realise.

Incorrect. I'm telling you how I use the word. I use the word in the way that it's commonly understood. And I'm pointing out that, going by this meaning, your statement is a contradiction in terms. — S

Then the way you’re using it is question-begging, and the way it is commonly understood is also question-begging, in the context of this argument.

This is your problem, not mine. Use a different word instead of the word "universe", because the word "universe" means everything that exists. — S

No, it’s yours. Because your definition is question-begging and mine is not.

I'm not saying anything at all (in these comments about how I use the term "universe") about what does or doesn't exist, what can or can't exist. I'm simply making a declaration that whatever exists, I'm going to call it "part of the universe." — Terrapin Station

But God is God precisely because he is not a part of anything. If he was, he would he subject to a higher encompassing reality, and so vulnerable to the same criticisms you can make against necessity in atheism.

I don't agree with that, no. How am I implicitly arguing something? — Terrapin Station

Your definition of the universe precludes that there can be anything beyond it, the issue under discussion. Your implict argument runs: “The universe is everything, so there can be nothing beyond the universe, because the universe is everything.”

In my comment about how I use the word "universe," I'm not arguing anything, for or against. Do you understand this? — Terrapin Station

You are, implicitly. Do you understand this?

"Beyond the universe" is what we call a contradiction in terms. — S

Only if you’re using your question-begging definition of the universe.

Do you understand the difference between a conclusion and a stipulation about how I'm using a term? — Terrapin Station

The arguments for theism demonstrate the existence of an entity beyond the universe; that is what you’re up against when you argue in opposition to theism. If you define the universe as “everything”, you define away precisely what is under discussion; that’s called begging the question, because your conclusion is there within your argument.

It's just what the word means. I use the word the same way as him, as do lots of other people. — S

Using it that way in the context of an argument about the existence of God makes it question-begging; it assumes that there is nothing beyond the universe, the issue under discussion.

But then one could say it is no more arbitrary than invoking an additional eternal entity. — leo

It’s invoked as an explanation in the absence of one, arrived at through various logical steps, and not simply created to suit an already settled outlook.

Is that what an atheist rests his belief on? The Universe exists just because the Universe exists? If that’s true, I’m sure as hell not sending him any get-well-soon cards, that’s for sure.

Can you....do you have the capacity.....to explain the concept “beyond time”, such that anyone considering the phrase as the result of magical thinking, would have to change his mind? — Mww

Yes, unless I’m missing something the atheist is forced to believe that.

Beyond time, not subject to time, does not begin, does not end, does not change.

As Carl Sagan would say, why not just say that the universe always existed, instead of saying that some God that always existed created the universe? — leo

Because applying eternality to the universe is arbitrary and completely lacking in explanation. God, by virtue of being beyond time, is necessarily eternal.

Because God has the quality of eternality by virtue of being beyond time, not just because. The atheist, by contrast, must rest his belief about the universe on precisely that ”just because”.

But it's not an argument, lol. Only arguments can have argumentative fallacies. It doesn't make any sense to apply argumentative fallacies to things that aren't arguments. — Terrapin Station

Your definition requires that your conclusion - that there is nothing beyond the universe - is true. That makes your definition question-begging; no need to be concrete about it.

Not at all. In fact, I explicitly wrote above that if there were a god, that god would be a part of the universe per how I use the term "universe." Didn't you read that when I wrote it above?

There can't be anything beyond the universe per my usage of universe, because whatever there is, whatever its nature would be--including gods--it would be part of the universe. All I'm doing there is telling you how I use a term. — Terrapin Station

And I explained that God, according to classical monotheism, is not a creature within the universe, but rather an entity beyond it. A god that was part of the universe would not be God, because it would be subject to the magic that accounted for its existence.

Again, whether there is something beyond the universe is what is under discussion; to define it away begs the question.

That's not a third option. Either the god always existed or it appeared from nothing. — Terrapin Station

God, according to the arguments for theism, is eternal by virtue of being beyond the universe, and so beyond time. This is different to simply being an inexplicably necessary part of the universe.

How can an atheist be accused of magical thinking if he happens to accord with a theist’s belief, re: the Universe either accounts for its own existence or something else does”? — Mww

The universe either accounts for its own existence, or something beyond it does. The atheist doesn’t accord with the second option, since a creator beyond the universe is what we call God.

Re "beyond the universe" I'm telling you how I use the term "universe." That's not an argument, it's a statement about a concept per my usage. — Terrapin Station

And your concept of the universe is question-begging: By defining it as “everything” you assume there is nothing beyond it, and therefore no God, which is precisely the issue under discussion.

Re the paragraph starting with "No matter what," that's again not an argument. It's simply a statement reporting what I believe to be a logical dichotomy. If you know of a third option, I'd be glad to hear it. — Terrapin Station

The third option is creation by a transcendent God, which your dichotomy precludes because it assumes there isn’t one.

At any rate, for some reason you're taking me to be forwarding arguments with premises and conclusions when I'm not. — Terrapin Station

You are, your premises are your conclusions, and vice versa.

There can't be something "beyond" the universe. — Terrapin Station

If there were a god, the god would be part of the universe. — Terrapin Station

No matter what, we're only left with either things appearing "out of nowhere" or with things always existing... There's no way around that. So although counterintuitive, there are simply no other options. — Terrapin Station

Those are your premises and conclusions, combined.

There can't be something "beyond" the universe. If there were a god, the god would be part of the universe. Again, I use "universe" to refer to everything.

No matter what, we're only left with either things appearing "out of nowhere" or with things always existing, and both are counterintuitive. There's no way around that. So although counterintuitive, there are simply no other options. — Terrapin Station

That’s pure question-begging, amounting to nothing more than, “You’re wrong, because I’m right.”

Well I believe theism is different in that regard, but that’s beside the point of my question, which is that if you acknowledge the magical element of atheism, why do you find theism so ludicrous? The universe either accounts for its own existence, or something beyond it does.

Are you aware that on atheism you’re forced to believe the universe just is, and there’s no explanation why? That some part of it accounts for its own existence, by what you can very fairly characterise as magic?

I actually don’t know enough about God’s timelessness/immutability to argue about this. But my initial point stands; he’s not anything at all like an orbiting rabbit.

I can make sense of something having no beginning and no end, or being able to experience all of time as a whole, rather than from moment to moment; but of course I can’t imagine what that would be like. Perhaps there are logical reasons why you couldn’t have either, akin to why you can’t have a square circle, but I’m not currently aware of any.

It’s impossible to imagine an infinity of something, but that doesn’t make the concept of infinity incoherent.

No. Impossible to imagine with our Euclidean minds, but not incoherent.

You don't reserve judgment on ridiculous nonsense for anything else (like the cigar-smoking rabbits in Jupiter's atmosphere, and that isn't even incoherent) — Terrapin Station

The arguments for theism demonstrate the existence of a transcendent, and so timeless and immaterial, God; not simply a creature residing somewhere in the universe.

Yeah, well you don’t hear much optimism about the current state of the West.

No problem. But that’s it then: A reason for believing, plus faith, or “an act of reasoned belief”, and there’s your Christian.

The Kalam Cosmological Argument gives a sound enough rational reason for believing in God. Its premises, though rebutted, have not been refuted and so are reasonable to believe, and therefore the conclusion too.