[ledwix]

What I see as a theme ITT is the fine line between proximate and ultimate causation. A few of you guys don't understand that nature is endowed with certain laws that govern the motion of particles. For instance, all the objects in the world tend to be forced toward the same point: the center of mass of the earth. How is it that we are all attracted to the exact same point in the earth's core, without even trying or even being aware of it? Well, nature is endowed with an attractive force on all bodies, charged and uncharged, that works across large distances. Our bodies don't fly in random directions but instead all fall toward the same point in a rather organized series of events. But does gravity imply that an intelligent being is constantly, actively working to push everything down? No. And in the same way, nature doesn't necessarily act completely randomly at the chemical level. There is some natural degree of organization that takes place with organic molecules. The question then becomes not necessarily the low chance of life forming in any given place but instead the origin of these natural laws themselves. As for the ultimate causation, I am led to conclude divine intervention, whereas most atheists would conclude "we are working on it, but we cannot say anything for sure yet." In essence, I feel that the theistic position is that there does exist an ultimate cause, whereas the atheistic position is that the ultimate cause exists only as another proximate cause leading to the universe's initial conditions.