skepticalbip said:
As I said earlier and you ignored their argument is equivalent to:
Only god can make a banana.
There are bananas.
Therefore god.
And yet you claim that they are winning debates with this nonsense.
First, as I told you repeatedly, I didn't want to argue with you. Why are you picking a fight?
Second, I already addressed an argument you told me I hadn't addressed, and which of course I hadn't addressed because I was not interested in that, but in explaining their argument.
Third, I explained
why they win the debates. They win because their atheist opponents keep misrepresenting their arguments, and the theists in question reply by telling them that they don't even understand, and then the atheists keep replying and arguing against what they believe the theists are saying but aren't, and then the theists keep pointing out how the atheists in question keep attacking strawmen, etc. Well, that and the metaethical and sometimes ethical mistakes that the atheists in question keep making and the theists keep highlighting. The theists of course are making a terrible argument and also keep making metaethical mistakes, but their atheists opponents fail to point that out, because they fail to see what the mistakes are, because they don't even understand what the theists are saying. That's partly the fault of some theist philosophers due to their obscurity, but it's also the fault of atheists who just keep misreading repeatedly.
Fourth, again, the meat of the argument is not the formal argument; it's the argument in the sense of arguing the case; it's the arguments given in support of the premises.
For that matter, you could say the following argument is also equivalent.
1. If God did exist, then there would be no instances of rape for fun or power.
2. There are instances of rape for fun or power.
C. It is not the case that God exists.
But that's not equivalent in any relevant sense (yes, the formal argument has the same basic form; so what? Are you against simple syllogisms?).
The issue is what reasons can be given in support of the premises. The reasons theists give in support of their premises are different from the reasons they give in support of the claim that nothing can exist without God, so their metaethical argument is independent from the argument from contingency.
Yes, it's still a really bad argument of course. But you're attacking it the wrong way. And again, why do you want to debate with me? I'm not defending that really bad argument, and I told you repeatedly that I didn't want to debate you. This is impolite.
Look, you want some theists who would defend the argument?
You can go find them at
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/forums/moral-argument/
However, if Wade Tisthammer is still posting there, you should avoid engagement or radically improve your game (compared to what you've been doing so far in this thread).
Also, I cannot guarantee there won't be similar philosophically inclined theists, so it would be at your peril.