And in expected fashion, threads trail off to general religious discussion, which is usually harmless.
DaveC, if god did do our (your) parlor tricks. And it was recorded on camera. And a conspiracy theorist published the opinion that it can't be truly god, because god wouldn't need to do tricks to prove himself for his creation, so it must be a ploy by the government or something to hoodwink the people. would you find the conspiracy theorist's logic to be weak?
And which parlor tricks? I'm sure every athiest would need different criteria to he met, is god expected to meet each and every one?
What about 10 generations of humans down? Should god preform the tricks annually? Would our recording media be still considered as strong evidence 10 or 50 or 1000 years from now?
If there truly was a god, and I ask you to truly simulate that possibility in its entirety as a system.. for example, if you were a god, would you feel the need to prove yourself to each and every one of your germ subjects?
And why did you create them in the first place? Just to prove to them beyond a shred of doubt that you exist? That's why you created them?
Many athiest in their examination of the concept of god put him as if he was a fake musician and they're masters of the art and he needs to meet their demands in order to get their approval. Imagine every undergrad student you teach demands that you pass their own custom written series of examinations to prove to them that you really do have a PhD .
You can also ditch school because college is for snobs :shrug: