In the strict sense (i.e. total knowledge about everything in the universe), that is a tautology, if only because we lie outside the light cone of some events.

However, I am not entirely sure about the natural laws. While we keep discovering deeper layers and more details, nothing makes an infinite regression absolutely necessary. It is possible that the set of natural laws is finite, and thus can be known entirely.

Yes, with one additional point. If god intervenes in ways that do not require his intervention, but could have happened just the same without him, then there is no necessity for him. There is truly random fluctuations at the quantum level, for all we know, and god could, theoretically, be controlling those, and excerting some kind of extremely subtle influence that way. However, he would have to stay within the limits of statistical probabilities or else we would have evidence there in the unlikely events. Pretty much the argument ID is trying to make, except that it doesn't apply to evolution.

But then we are a far cry from any of the gods of any human religion. Basically, "god" would just be a fancy term for random quantum fluctuations.

My reply would be: "Who created the creator?" - as your god is omnieverything, he can not have a creator (because whoever created god would by necessity be more powerful than god).
But if god needs no creator - then why to the laws of physics?

I have to continue later, friends are coming over...

Only because you put it forth as an axiom.

Formulate it as a hypothesis. I've asked this before, but not as clear: You have a theory there - a meta-science theory on the limits of science. What would convince you that it is false?

If you can not name a criterion for falsification, then you don't have a theory, you have a belief.

You don't need an experiment. I will agree that, due to the way that religion continuously re-defines the features of its assumed "god", no single experiment will ever be accepted as proof of nonexistance.

But here is the argument:

Assume a hypothetical world, say the aquarium in the lobby, just to have a picture in our minds.
Formulate a theory that an external entity, say the janitor, subtly influences events inside the aquarium.
Imagine you are inside the aquarium, with no way to leave it.

How can you prove or disprove the existence of the janitor?

The answer is: By carefully examining everything inside and looking for clues of outside effects. The more of what is going on inside you can explain entirely by what is inside, the less likely outside interference becomes.

If you can show that everything that has ever happened inside the aquarium would have happened exactly like it did without anyone from the outside interfering, you have proved that there was no outside effect.

In simpler words: If god never does anything, then the question of his existence becomes meaningless.

I'm not going to write down the entire body of scientific knowledge into /. comments. That is why I keep asking what evidence you need, which arguments disproving would convince you.

For every theory in my natural world, I can name a criterion for, if not falsification than intense checking. I believe in gravity. The theory of gravity makes specific statements about cause and effect, and they can be investigated. If they suddenly show results different from the expected, the theory would be under scrutiny.

So, once more, what would make you question your faith? Name it, and it shall be provided. If you can't name it, please be so kind and remove any reference to science from your argument and at least have the balls to state that you have simply choosen to belief in something no matter what the evidence.

Show me a documented event in the history of the world that can not be explained without accepting the existence of god, and I will change my mind.

Misery follows if you are unable to follow the status quo as "good enough for now".

Nobody said this would be the status quo forever. But change takes time, and the faster you move something big, the more friction you create. And if you move a country too fast, you can destroy it. Unrest, civil war, massive unemployment, runaway inflation, etc. etc.

It's easy to talk about change on /. - when you are responsible for more than a billion people, you ought to be a lot more careful.

That's not violent, but it is hostile. They want to take advantage of me, to my detriment and their profit. Whatever term you put on it, I'd call it hostile (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hostile, definition 1c).

Many years ago, at the Chaos Communications Camp in Berlin, I suggested that people trade their customer cards at random every once in a while, to mess up the profiling.

Unfortunately, back then the whole thing was only starting, and too few people had matching cards to make much of a difference. Maybe someone should re-launch that idea.

Yes, it is similar. There is a difference between the doer and the deed, between the believer and the belief.

Contrary to the fanatics, they can believe all the bullshit they want, as long as they keep it to themselves. When they force it on me, into the schools, into politics, or into an otherwise rational discussion, I get upset. Just like I don't mind gays at all, but I would object to being sexually assaulted by one. Being gay doesn't give you special rights to force your sexuality on others, and being religious shouldn't give you special rights to force your fucked-up belief system on others.

He's a magician, not a scientist. You may want to keep that in mind. Nevertheless, he uses methods from science, and while his focus is on the individuals who claim they have psychic or other powers, over time his sample size has become rather large, wouldn't you agree.

First, it was 500, not 300. Two, the results are controversial, with critics showing that considering random deviations, even the 6 most successful cases are only slightly better than chance.

You also ignore that there have been follow-up studies with much clearer results, all of them showing no dowsing abilities in the test subjects whatsoever.

Around 1%, assuming he picks at random. Which he doesn't. You ignore that if there were dowsers who are reliably successful, then why are they not coming forward? There's a million bucks on the table, after all.

Yes, but only of the "God" as defined here, not of any specific god of any religion. If you re-define words at will, you can prove everything from anything, but the words become meaningless.

But even so, it contains an unproven assumption: That there was an active process of creation. That there was a subject (gramatically speaking) to do the creating. If you allow for a passive interpretation, and accept that everything could have come into existence spontaneously, with no prior cause, then "God" is essentially a synonym for "the universe". Which, yes, if viewed as an entity can be considered omnipresent and omniscient. I am willing to accept this definition of "God", but at the same time, it is meaningless because it is just a different word for something that already has a perfectly good word for it.

According to our current understanding, these are the only reasonable alternatives. Cause and effect has no meaning without time (due to the requirement of satisfying relativity). So the beginning of time can not have a prior cause - pretty much by definition, because there is no "prior" to time itself.

Only in pop science. We have an answer, and the answer is: Nothing happened just before that, because the concept of "before" doesn't have a meaning there.

Yes, that is pretty much what I've been saying. "God" is apparently very fond of moving around, because the believers always claim that he's here and there, and every time you open the lid, he's nowhere to be found, moved to the next higher level of abstraction.

I'm with Nietzsche on that one: A thing that has no effect whatsoever on anything external does not have an existence in any meaningful sense of the word.

That doesn't change any arguments.

By doing what you critizise in others: Repeating your statement, with no supporting argument.

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. You are not entitled to your own facts. And that's the problem I have with your kind. I don't have a problem with you as a person - I don't even know you, so how could I? - but every argument you've put forth is logically flawed, and you know that if you stop to think. Like the creator of an experiment being entirely not the same as the creator of the universe, unless your experiment is testing whether it has a creator.

And no, the funny thing is that if I am right then we will not know for sure once we get there, because there's nothing to get to, and when you're dead there's no "you" left to know anything.

I never said they don't try. A shop as big as their tries all sorts of stuff. I've yet to see them succeed, though, because almost all of their "innovations" suck. Microsoft is the China of the computing world - whenever they come up with something original, everyone else cringes. But they're great at stealing your ideas and making a cheap knock-off.

In my book, "innovation" includes a little more than "doing something a little different than before". Otherwise, every other time you get out of bed you'd be "innovating". The tricky - and decisive - part of any innovation, invention and progress is never the cute idea. Ideas are a dime a dozen. The important part is making it happen.

The measure on your ability to create a new market is the existence of said market after the fact. Apple didn't invent the tablet as a concept, but they sure created the tablet market. All sales figures of all tablets combined prior to the release of the iPad were dwarved in what? A month?

Show me a case of MS doing the same and I'll eat my words.