It’s when ‘material’ began.
Lest you forget (you seem to have)…
“Appeals to imagined forces and phenomena have been the basis for all the cosmological models proposed to avoid the big bang implications about God. The disproof of these models and the ongoing appeal by nontheists to more and more bizarre unknowns and unknowables seem to reflect the growing strength of the case for theism.”
How do you know nothing material existed at the time of the big bang?
I didn’t think it deserved mention.
I’m not appealing to anything. You have work to do to demonstrate the truth of your assertion.
It’s a good bet. I wouldn’t bet against it.
Actually, I don’t.
It looks unknown to me.
Actually, I don’t.
Sure you do, if you want me to believe God was involved. If you don’t want want to make the case, insisting others are being unreasonable in not believing it seems very churlish.
A priori dismissing the existence of the immaterial is reasonable?
Who did that? Not me
You disallow the immaterial if you disallow it as a reasonable inference.
I haven’t done that.
Actually, I don’t. No one has claimed to be able to prove that the cause of the big bang is immaterial, but it is good evidence.
Good.
Why is it good evidence? In fact, why is it evidence that supports your conclusion at all? This work needs to be done by someone. I’ll go back to what I said eariler, as it seems this is all that is being said:
It’s easy to say “the universe began… I believe my God created the universe from the beginning… that the universe began is evidence of that.”
I’ll just let those questions stand. They speak for themselves.
How do you know that?
How so? Please elaborate.
You don’t understand how evidence works. Let’s use a murder as our example.
Let’s say we are both on the jury during the murder trial. The prosecution presents a single argument: John Smith committed the murder and the sole piece of “evidence” is the dead body. As a member of the jury, I can not convict John Smith because the dead body isn’t evidence of his guilt. Why? The same evidence would apply to any person or no person, not John Smith specifically. Does this mean I have a confirmation bias where I will never allow John Smith to be guilty? Absolutely not.
The same applies to your argument. You are simply assuming from the start that God created the universe, so you somehow think that the universe is evidence for God. Evidence doesn’t work that way. You need facts that specifically point to God.
If the evidence doesn’t point to God, then why would God be a reasonable inference? You are putting the cart before the horse.
Appeals to imagined forces and phenomena is exactly your argument.
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How is appeals to an omnipotent divine person living in the absence of a physical brain and body, outside of time and space, not an appeal to an “imaginary force”?
And why do you think the Big Bang implies God? The universe expanded from an extremely hot and dense state. So what? What does that have to do with God?