Here's what I was referring to, although it's many pages back now. You proposed an intelligent manipulator as a god that created this universe, which in its simplest form is the grad student god, then when asked what made it a god instead of a hyperdimensional grad student, you proposed that it was immortal, which only meant that it (and presumably things like it) simply didn't die in that hyperuniverse, which to my mind didn't make it any more godlike from our perspective than it already was.
But regarding these two ideas of god, no, I'm not arguing that anything would be inconsequential.
If you're talking about a god "that is spirit/mind and whose actions we see in the universe as the laws of physics" then you're going to have to explain to me what that means, if it means anything distinguishable from the kind of brute physics that has replaced god.
I can tell you, though, you're in trouble as soon as you get to putting a slash between spirit and mind.
On the other hand, if you're talking about a "deistic god" which is "not within the universe" then you're supposedly talking about something you could never have even heard of, so that can't possibly be what we're talking about.
In either case, there's nothing to be consequential or inconsequential. It doesn't even rise to that.
Two points:
I will repeat again, when it comes to the deistic god it is not the case that we are left with "you could never have heard of it" because the path to the deistic god goes through an examination of being. We are talking about the possibility of such a god existing are we not? I am not proposing to know how that god functions. That theists can't turn around and say that they know how that god thinks without contradicting themselves goes without saying.
Second issue, when it comes to what you refer to as the grad student god, my impression was that you were referring to a deist god with that example. If you mean a caretaker god, then that's fine too. But the issue we are discussing is whether such a god could exist not whether someone would pray to it to save their child. There is no telling what a person might do with an underlying god belief. And we know that people have and do worship a deist type god.
You have to change your perspective. That all we can see is the laws of physics doesn't mean that a god that creates the universe and controls the laws of physics is the same as not-god. The alternative to the theist believing in such a god is non-existence, no universe, not physics without a god controlling it. What's left over in your Venn diagram from the theist's perspective is everything because they approach the issue from an entirely different perspective from you.
The underlying issue here, as with all discussions about theism and idealism, is a difference in ways of approaching the world. However many ways of approaching things there might be, we (people in general) approach our understanding of all-that-is from one of two approaches that are easiest to call matter and mind to leave out the confound of god-talk. Either there is no intention underlying the universe or there is. That is all this amounts to.
We have no way to tell if there is or is not intention underlying all that is. You and I both know that there is no reason to propose that there is intention behind it all and that humans tend to project minds onto objects that don't have minds; consequently we are prone to see intention behind the universe. Unfortunately all that line of reasoning can produce is doubt in our minds about the likelihood of the universe being intentional. We can call that doubt strong or weak, but it doesn't rise to the level of knowledge of the background of the world.
Saying that there is intention behind the world, that intention caused the world is not saying nothing. I haven't the slightest idea how you could propose that it is.
It is the case that a god either exists or doesn't exist. It is not the case that a theist making the claim that she believes god exists and is responsible for the world says nothing; and it is definitely not the case that such a theist proposes a god that is indistinguishable from not-god from her perspective.
The situation is this: we see the world. We examine the world. We arrive at rules by which we think the world exists; that's all that we can do. We can't tell when we examine the world what ultimately is 'behind it' for want of a better phrase (and that is the wrong phrase). More correctly, we can't answer metaphysical questions.
You are misapplying your Venn diagram, I think, assuming that there is only one possible way of looking at this issue; but the reality is that there are two entirely different paradigms being used. From a materialist position, when you look at your Venn diagram you see god as an extraneous addition and so you say it means nothing. But that is not the theist's way of looking at it. From her perspective the difference between god and not-god is literally the difference between nothing and everything. She would see no overlap between the god, not-god Venn diagrams. I've tried to tell you that more than once now (I assume that you missed it earlier). You have assumed in your use of the Venn diagram that the laws of physics already occur independent of god; that is entirely appropriate in universes without god. But if god exists then the laws of physics do not occur without him.
You cannot subtract the one from the other, from one perspective, because they approach the answer from entirely different perspectives. But you cannot subtract the one from the other from another perspective because they are literally not the same thing. The not-god, there is no intention behind the world laws of physics is what we are used to calling the laws of physics. The yes-god, there is intention behind the world laws of physics is another thing entirely. It looks to us the same because we are stuck in the world unable to distinguish what is responsible for the world. But the intentional-laws-of-physics, though it looks the same as the non-intentional laws of physics, is actually an entirely different thing (it is intentional). In short, I don't see how you can use the approach you are taking. But if you maintain the ability to do the 'math', then what is left over is the intention and the intender. That is still not nothing; I don't see you could argue that nothing is left over.
As to a full explanation of how god works, why is that necessary? Once again, I thought we were discussing whether or not god was possible. From a theist perspective the answer is that god is responsible for all existence and s/he directs all that is intentionally. I fail to see how that is literally nothing.
The second definition is simply that the mythological god has failed to be proven and hence I will proceed to claim no god just as I claim no leprechaun etc. When proof is offered the conclusion is changed. Another words it is a tentative answer until the evidence comes in. A null position, whatever you want to call it. God doesn't have to be understood by the non believers. It is the believers job to present the evidence and make it understood. Until that point "no god".
