A consideration for an alternative to design.
Is it not an honest inquiry to consider whether the universe operates on a random basis according to the laws of nature instead of a controlling imaginary deity? Check out "The Random Universe" for such an alternative.
SOURCE URL: http://www.interpretativevisions.com
Bynner spent decades with a Chinese linguist and published in American prose.
Poem 1
Existence is beyond the power of words
To define:
Terms may be used
But are none of them absolute.
In the beginning of heaven and earth there were no words,
Words came out of the womb of matter;
And whether a man dispassionately
Sees to the core of life
Or passionately
Sees the surface,
The core and the surface
Are essentially the same,
Words making them seem different
Only to express appearance.
If name be needed, wonder names them both:
From wonder into wonder
Existence opens.
An honest, reasoning sentient, finding no repetitive evidence, shall pursue other methods of inquiry to a question.
Question: Quest-I-On or Quest-shun. The former is a continual process of seeking knowledge, the latter of willful develop-mental arrest.
Rand addressed your postulate in 1961: The Objectivist's Ethics. The word-symbol-metaphor-concept is Mysticism. Man cannot embrace mysticism and be reasoning.
Poem 21
The surest test if a man be sane
Is if he accepts life whole, as it is,
Without needing by measure or touch to understand
The measureless untouchable source
Of its images,
The measureless untouchable source
Of its substances,
The source which, while it appears dark emptiness,
Brims with a quick force
Farthest away
And yet nearest at hand
From oldest time unto this day,
Charging its images with origin:
What more need I know of the origin
Than this?
To express belief/faith as fact is hubris. A most common malady of arrested development.
no sale skippy
no sale
anyone looking at the design of Life and believes there is no God is not a serious person
the book Darwin's Black Box outlines the basic logical argument
you cannot even refute the arguments in the book
and as we are learning with the James Webb Telescope, man's theories are falling by the wayside as we continue to see further and learn more
get a damn clue and stop worshiping yourself, Lucifer
There is a distinct difference between belief/faith and theory. The former is an unsupported expression as fact. The latter is an expression of an idea that may be pursued to reason-abled end as to truth or not. Rand, very carefully, with distinct definition, syntax and conceptualization, describes belief/faith as Mysticism in The Objectivist's Ethics. Her essay may be tested, repeatedly, upon any subject matter, unilaterally, amongst any and all sentients ..... not just Human .... any Sentient in the entire Universe.
And since you issued forth the epithet, Lucifer. I must ask; Would you condone or condemn that which was done in Salem Mass.in 1692 and 1693?
I do take Theism as Theory. An unproven idea. It is not without decades of thought and experience that I dismiss, due to lack of evidence. If this were discoverable and repeatable as fact .... there would never be an argument. I shall never refute an objective metaphoric expression of values based morality, and, an objective ethical expression of process, in the discovery of values and morals ...... from any historical writings/teachings.
The litmus is that ALL Values begin with Mortality of Living Things. That which is good or bad for the sustaining of Life.
And so, let us apply Theory to philosophy. Theos and Theism are philosophical pursuits of the nature of the universe .... and so is perception/conceptualization through the medium of expressive language and reason.
I have emotional and physical perceptions. I use expressive language (definition, syntax and context) to conceptualize and reason as my language skills increase. This requires my will to expand all the tools focused on the goal of knowledge. Man needs to Know. When Man gives up the pursuit of expanding these tools, and settles for a simple "description" of His existence, He arrests development. The only acceptable self-arresting developmental statement is: I don't know, and I have not the tools to discover the proposed knowledge." This is a noble characteristic.
The use of force or coercion to accept belief instills fear. This can manifest as perverse as murder or as subtle as shunning.
This is an expression of 35 years of objective philosophical pursuit, without knowing "Objectivism" existed as a study. 35 years of Tao te'ching .... and then, The Objectivist's Ethics for the past ten, on top of this. I tried to tear Rand's essay apart to invalidate. The only shortcomings I have found is that she did not explicitly address Language as the base for all conceptualization and; when I applied the emotional context of "I Care" and its extension of Empathy, a "wholeness" or Integrity blossomed. The expressive language piece comes from Dan Appleton (aka Philosoraptor from Quora website) published in Dec. of 2021.
I find I only need three pieces of human publishing to evaluate my life and what transpires around it. All within 100 pages of reading. How profound! This is available to anyone. I'm fortunate, after thousands of hours of reading, to discover. I know there is a gold mining metaphor waiting in the wings.