February 25, 2011

Atheists Epistemological Lacking

In our continued search to help explain reality to the Atheists, as a public service, I stumbled upon something that was very interesting and rare. It was a systematic argumentation from Van Til's work as well as something from another Christian philosopher named Alvin Plantinga.

Putting these two arguments together as one syllogism, makes the argument for God and knowledge. Also included in the paper was some juicy nuggets of logic that will be interesting to watch Atheists attempt to counter. The paper goes in to lengthy detail behind the entire argument. So, if you want any explanation of a point in question, please refer to the paper written. I am merely pointing to the argument, in its entirety, so we can present it to the Atheists.

Maybe an Atheist can come up with a systematic argumentation of their beliefs for the purpose of accountability of their reasoning. I have yet come across such a paper, if it even exists. It would be quite helpful to flesh out the truth if it were presented to us. Takers?

The Paper:


IF KNOWLEDGE THEN GOD:
THE EPISTEMOLOGICAL THEISTIC ARGUMENTS OF PLANTINGA AND VAN TIL
by James Anderson

It sets up and addresses many of the same arguments that we are having here. Things like Atheists claim if we are to have knowledge, then we must be omniscient. Look what Van Til says about that.

"The only way then for man to have any knowledge of either temporal or eternal things is for a God to think for us in eternal categories and reveal to us the Measure of truth we can fathom. Thus we hold that Christian theism is the only alternative to skepticism.
We must not argue as though we can already know a great deal about nature by itself but that, inasmuch as we cannot know all that ought to be known about it, there must be one who knows infinitely more than we do. We must rather reason that unless God exists as ultimate, as self-subsistent, we could not even know anything; we could not even reason that God must exist, nor could we even ask a question about God.
The Calvinist, therefore, using his point of contact, observes to the non-Christian that if the world were not what Scripture says it is, if the natural man’s knowledge were not actually rooted in the creation and providence of God, then there could be no knowledge whatsoever." ~(Refs in Anderson's paper)

One of the most interesting points, that we even have been struggling with here, is “Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism.” (EEAN) "The basic idea behind EAAN is simple enough to grasp: if one believes that humans are the product of undirected naturalistic evolutionary processes, one thereby has good reason to doubt the deliverances of one’s own mind — including, of course, the belief that humans are the product of undirected naturalistic evolutionary processes. This belief is thus irrational, since it is self-defeating."

"EAAN is an argument not for the falsity of naturalism, but for the irrationality of naturalism (regardless of whether it is true or not). Second, the argument does not purport to show that naturalism as such is irrational; rather, it is a certain kind of epistemologically self-conscious naturalism that finds itself mired in the quicksand of skepticism. Third, Plantinga takes EAAN to function indirectly as an argument for theism, given that theism is the only credible alternative to naturalism."

Plantinga writes "If I reject theism in favor of ordinary naturalism, and also see that [the probability that my cognitive faculties are reliable given that naturalism is true] is low or inscrutable, then I will have a defeater for any belief I hold. If so, I will not, if forming beliefs rationally, hold any belief firmly enough to constitute knowledge. The same goes if I am merely agnostic as between theism and ordinary  naturalism."

The systematic argument:

Where R is the proposition that our cognitive faculties are reliable (i.e., that they furnish us with mostly true beliefs), N is the proposition that metaphysical naturalism is the case, and E the proposition that human beings arose by way of commonly accepted evolutionary processes:

(1) P(R/N&E) is either low or inscrutable.

for any person S:

(2) If S believes both N&E and (1), then S has a defeater for R.
(3) If S has a defeater for R, then S has a defeater for all S’s beliefs, including
the belief that N&E.
(4) For any (human) person S to have knowledge, S must have beliefs produced
by cognitive faculties functioning properly according to a good design plan
aimed at true-belief production.
(5) If metaphysical naturalism is the case, then no (human) person has cognitive
faculties that (in any literal sense) function properly according to a good
design plan aimed at true-belief production.
(6) Therefore, if metaphysical naturalism is the case, then no (human) person
has knowledge.
(7) But some (human) persons do have knowledge; therefore, metaphysical
naturalism is not the case.
(8) Therefore, given the implausibility of other alternatives, theism is the case.

Where MR stands for metaphysical realism, T for theism, and GS for global skepticism:

(9) If MR and ~T, then GS [Plantinga’s adaptation of Putnam’s thesis].
(10) MR [since its denial is counter intuitive and reduces to absurdity].
(11) ~GS [since we know things about the world].
(12) Therefore, either ~MR or T [from (9) and (11)].
(13) Therefore, T [from (10) and (12)].
(14) The ontology of the universe is such that either (a) unity is ultimate and not
plurality, or (b) plurality is ultimate and not unity, or (c) unity and plurality
are co-ultimate.
(15) If unity is ultimate and not plurality, then knowledge of the universe (even
in part) is impossible.
(16) If plurality is ultimate and not unity, then knowledge of the universe (even
in part) is impossible.
(17) Knowledge of the universe is not impossible.
(18) Therefore, the ontology of the universe must be such that unity and plurality
are co-ultimate.
(19) Therefore, Christian theism is the case (since only Christian theism posits an
ontology in which unity and plurality are co-ultimate).
(20) If no one has comprehensive knowledge of the universe, then no one can
have any knowledge of the universe.
(21) Only God could have comprehensive knowledge of the universe.
(22) We have some knowledge of the universe.
(23) Therefore, God exists.
(24) If theism is not the case, then one cannot account for the uniformity of
nature presupposed by inductive reasoning.
(25) If one cannot account for the uniformity of nature presupposed by inductive
reasoning, then beliefs based on inductive reasoning are not warranted.
(26) Beliefs based on inductive reasoning are warranted.
(27) Therefore, theism is the case.
(28) Human knowledge and communication are possible only if (i) the world
exhibits a coherent, relational structure and (ii) human minds possess a
common conceptual scheme which properly reflects that structure (and thus
allows for correspondence between the way the world is and the way we
think it is).
(29) If theism is not the case, then there are no grounds for believing (i) and (ii).
(30) Therefore, if theism is not the case, then there are no grounds for believing
that human knowledge and communication are possible.
(31) There are grounds for believing that human knowledge and communication
are possible.
(32) Therefore, theism is the case.

When you see the argument we are hard pressed to believe that evolutionary naturalism is all we have. There is guidance to our path of knowledge, and as Anderson pointed to in his Paper:

"[I]f God exists, then presumably he is able to so arrange things that the noetic faculties of human beings function in such a way as to implicitly take into account all that God alone knows. The idea is not that each one of us has an exhaustive knowledge of the universe tacitly built, as it were, into our cognitive apparatus. Rather, it is that — to use a motoring metaphor — we have been given reliable vehicles and set off in the right direction on accurately signposted, well constructed and well-connected roads. Or as Van Til remarks: “My unity [of knowledge] is the unity of a child who walks with its father through the woods.”

If only the Atheists would acknowledge these points, and the fact there is a path.


bit.ly/epistlack

106 comments:

  1. To anyone here who's interested, I'm currently engaged in a discussion with Dr Reluctant, who runs a comparatively sane and cerebral Christian blog - though one that is, I feel, subject to the same limitations on those qualities as any presuppositionalist has. Nevertheless, the discussion is aimed at addressing much the same issues of epistemology that Dan raises here, and you can read the latest round of the discussion here as well as the first of my rejoinders.

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  2. One of the most interesting points, that we even have been struggling with here, is “Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism.” (EEAN) "The basic idea behind EAAN is simple enough to grasp: if one believes that humans are the product of undirected naturalistic evolutionary processes, one thereby has good reason to doubt the deliverances of one’s own mind — including, of course, the belief that humans are the product of undirected naturalistic evolutionary processes. This belief is thus irrational, since it is self-defeating."

    This is quite simply an unsupported assertion, containing a misleading representation of what 'undirected evolutionary processes' actually entail. We live in a world of cause and effect, and we are products of cause and effect - consequently, our reasoning is built on the concept of cause and effect. Undirected does not imply random or chaotic, only a lack of conscious intent or design. It is far from irrational to base reason on blind natural forces.

    And if I may say so, it is quite arrogant of you to speak of explaining reality to atheists, considering that you erect your bible as a barrier to any direct appreciation of reality.

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  3. Hi Dan, I'm not a fan of Glenn Peoples but I'd like to quote him from here

    "But nowhere in any of his writings – or in the writings of Greg Bahnsen for that matter, will you ever find an argument for the claim that only Christianity could ever supply these things. I see absolutely no reason why Judaism or Islam, although I think they are wrong, would not provide a perfectly adequate basis for, say, science and morality."

    So, let's say you're right. Tell me why being a believer in any other faith is in error.

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  4. Basically, if you're going to reject reality and experience as your path to truth, you might as well choose any old fiction you like. Dan and his fellow presuppers just happen to have settled on Christianity.

    What's more, if we break down the continual requests for an 'accounting' of any alternative worldview, we see at its core the insistence of frightened conscious beings faced with a vast impersonal universe, that there must be someone behind it, someone they can relate to on a more or less personal level. "But what's it for?" they cry. It doesn't have to be 'for' anything. It just is.

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  5. Rather, it is that — to use a motoring metaphor — we have been given reliable vehicles and set off in the right direction on accurately signposted, well constructed and well-connected roads.

    Dan, why must we have been given reliable vehicles? Why could not the vehicles have been found to be reliable from experience? For example, certain actions (causes) lead to certain effects, on such a regular basis that it appears to be a solid truth about the world we inhabit.

    We live, according to everyone's experience (again, feel free to argue with this, but I don't think you'll get far), in a world of cause and effect. Indeed, I'm sure it was Einstein himself - whom the likes of Ray Comfort love to quote as proof against atheism - who said that insanity was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

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  6. We live, according to everyone's experience (again, feel free to argue with this, but I don't think you'll get far), in a world of cause and effect

    Although I think you're aware of it, please keep modern cosmology in mind. Cause <--> effect does not hold at the sub-atomic level. We may yet find that this has tangible consequences at the level of human experience.

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  7. True, WEM, but we also don't subscribe to a worldview that is claimed to have all the answers already. We work with what we find to be the case, until demonstrated otherwise.

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  8. Hi Paul,

    >>So, let's say you're right. Tell me why being a believer in any other faith is in error.

    Short answer Christianity is truth and the others are false.

    Long answer. Christianity is the only religion that addresses ontological and epistemological questions cohesively. Remember also Islam, for example, acknowledges the Bible's truth even if its a false religion.

    Also false religions have a common denominator and that is there assault on the term "Justification." They are working toward their salvation. We are working as a result of our salvation.

    Christianity is a result of what God did. It is an external response. For example, we love because he first loved us. The false religions out there have a completely different gospel. As a result they bring their filthy rags and present then to God thinking they are working their way to God. We have been made clean by the word. The false religions make themselves clean.

    Good question though.

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  9. DD,

    >>Why could not the vehicles have been found to be reliable from experience?

    You still cannot know the reliability of the vehicle you're in, yet you make that assumption. You depend on something that cannot be dependable by definition within your worldview. Past success does not equate to future successes. That is not knowing, that is trying.

    Is the principle of Cause and Effect accepted as a universal truth? If so, your argument is fading.

    Yes, my worldview makes epistemological sense. Yours? Not so much.

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  10. Dan
    Short answer Christianity is truth and the others are false.

    Long answer. Christianity is the only religion that addresses ontological and epistemological questions cohesively. Remember also Islam, for example, acknowledges the Bible's truth even if its a false religion.

    No it doesn't! It uses nothing but circular reasoning and "authority". God's word is true because it's gods word, that kind of crap.

    You and those other circle jerks like Sye TenB, Greg Bahnsen who keep asking: "Don't you think that an omniscient etc god could have revealed himself to us so that we could be sure of it?" Never actually go on to prove that that's exactly what she did.

    By the way, what is this "we" you keep mentioning in your post here?

    It's just YOU, Dan!

    Now, let's look at some of this shit:
    "The only way then for man to have any knowledge of either temporal or eternal things is for a God to think for us in eternal categories and reveal to us the Measure of truth we can fathom.
    Uh, no...we have our senses for that. And before you ask that "how do you know your senses are reliable" crap, just how do YOU know that your "revelation" from god is reliable? Is that not given through your senses as well?

    Thus we hold that Christian theism is the only alternative to skepticism.
    How so? Why not some other god?


    We must not argue as though we can already know a great deal about nature by itself but that, inasmuch as we cannot know all that ought to be known about it, there must be one who knows infinitely more than we do.
    Why do we have to make that assumption? So what if we don't know all about the nature of the universe? How does that imply that there MUST be some being who does?

    We must rather reason that unless God exists as ultimate, as self-subsistent, we could not even know anything;
    And where did you get THAT idea from? We didn't learn art or arithmetic from this god of yours, we don't need him to be able to see the world around us. We just have to open our eyes.

    we could not even reason that God must exist, nor could we even ask a question about God.
    Again, what's the actual justification for this, other than pulling it out of his ass?

    The Calvinist, therefore, using his point of contact, observes to the non-Christian that if the world were not what Scripture says it is, if the natural man’s knowledge were not actually rooted in the creation and providence of God, then there could be no knowledge whatsoever." ~(Refs in Anderson's paper)
    Geezus, that's just stupid. Nothing but bald assertions without evidence whatsoever.

    You people don't have the evidence on your side, so you came up with this circular reasoning crap to avoid having to provide evidence.

    Even Sye TenB in a debate with Paul Baird admitted that evidential arguing doesn't work too well.

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  11. I notice Dan, that even though that "Planned Parenthood" video was exposed as fake, you still have a link to the person who faked in the bottom of your links.

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  12. You still cannot know the reliability of the vehicle you're in, yet you make that assumption. You depend on something that cannot be dependable by definition within your worldview. Past success does not equate to future successes. That is not knowing, that is trying.

    And unless you're omniscient, Dan, that's all you have as well. You just live in denial. To quote Kierkegaard, Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.

    Is the principle of Cause and Effect accepted as a universal truth? If so, your argument is fading.

    How does this follow? Cause and effect is an observed truth about the world as we experience it. Certain causes are generally observed to have certain effects, but that doesn't mean there are no surprises. As WEM pointed out, it doesn't necessarily hold at the subatomic level, and cosmologists are getting closer all the time to an explanation for how the universe may have been self-causing. It is your god is fading, becoming obsolete.

    Yes, my worldview makes epistemological sense. Yours? Not so much.

    Your worldview is based on blind faith and denial of reality, Dan, and you know it. Does it make epistemological sense to you, for example, that your god visited a plague of darkness on the Egyptians, then made the sun stand still for Joshua, both after he had promised Noah that there would "always" be night and day? Clearly such promises are a bit flimsy in your fairytale world. How do you know your god won't keep his own counsel and decide to destroy the world tomorrow? Anything goes when your worldview is grounded in fantasy.

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  13. DD,

    >>Does it make epistemological sense to you, for example, that your god visited a plague of darkness on the Egyptians, then made the sun stand still for Joshua, both after he had promised Noah that there would "always" be night and day?

    Your gripes and complaints do not negate God's existence. Just because you do not know why['s], does not mean its not possible He exists.

    >>How do you know your god won't keep his own counsel and decide to destroy the world tomorrow?

    Because He said so, and He cannot lie, He has given evidence internally in His Word to this fact. All evidence points to that already understood, and presupposed, truth and universal fact. Do you have evidence to God lying? Otherwise, sound reasoning stands and your worldview is merely grounded in fantasy.

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  14. Blah blah blah. Don't answer the question, demand certainty, make statements of faith, and walk away feeling satisfied.

    Either Dan's a douche, or he's crippled by his oft-praised world view.

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  15. Your gripes and complaints do not negate God's existence. Just because you do not know why['s], does not mean its not possible He exists.


    Hmm...let's re-jig this from a naturalist perspective, shall we?

    "Your gripes and complaints do not negate a naturalistic explanation for observed and experienced phenomena. Just because you do not know why['s], does not mean it's not possible that such explanations will be found."

    How do you like them apples, Dan? The main difference is that when faced with problems, you presuppers stop enquiring, while the naturalists press on to discovery.

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  16. "In our continued search to help explain reality to the Atheists, as a public service,"

    what a joke!

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  17. Because He said so, and He cannot lie,

    Perhaps not, but he can certainly make statements vague enough to be misinterpreted.

    He has given evidence internally in His Word to this fact.

    Because we all just take someone's word that they're not a liar...

    By the way, Dan, are you aware that the first version of the Genesis creation story implies that the world coexisted with god from the beginning, and god just shaped it? Care to offer your take on that?

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  18. Hey Reynold,

    Can we expect an appearance by one of your other multiple internet personalities, or are they "sleeping" right now?

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  19. In this post you say that you answer my questions on the problem of evil and how you can trust biblical authority while rejecting autonomous reasoning.

    Neither are addressed in this post, which is Plantinga's argument against naturalism.

    Are you asserting that it's either Christian theism or naturalism? If you debunk naturalism therefore Christian theism?

    Is this your argument?

    I will ask my question again:

    If you can't trust your own reasoning abilities, then how exactly are you supposed to determine *which* revelations of God should be trusted?

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  20. Something is strange here - I wrote a post earlier today and it seems to have disappeared. Perhaps it hasn't been loaded or something.

    In any event, Dan, you directed me here, indicating that this post answered my questions. I don't see how it has.

    It seems that your worldviews is epistemically challenged. It cannot get off the ground as it's hopelessly internally contradictory.

    It says you cannot trust your own autonomous reasoning.
    You must rely on biblical revelation.
    How do you know what is a biblical revelation (or how to interpret it!) if you cannot autonomously reason?

    It seems that your worldview devolves into hopeless epistemic skepticism.

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  21. Dan Wrote: "Because He said so, and He cannot lie, He has given evidence internally in His Word to this fact.

    This is curious - why do you believe that this should continue to be the case? Seems circular to me. Just because he could not lie in the past (which seems to rule out omnipotence, btw), doesn't justify the idea that he couldn't lie in the future. Please rationally justify this belief.

    Dan Wrote: Do you have evidence to God lying?

    I don't think God exists, but I certainly think that the bible indicates such (note, whether you agree with this or not, the first part of my post still needs to be addressed):

    Jeremiah 4:10 Then said I, Ah, Lord GOD! surely thou hast greatly deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, Ye shall have peace; whereas the sword reacheth unto the soul.

    2 Thessalonians 2:11 And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie:

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  22. Dan, I think this verse was written for you ~

    Jeremiah 20:7 O LORD, You have deceived me and I was deceived; You have overcome me and prevailed. I have become a laughingstock all day long; Everyone mocks me.

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  23. DD,

    Because He said so, and He cannot lie,

    >>Perhaps not, but he can certainly make statements vague enough to be misinterpreted.

    “In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began” ~Titus 1:2-3

    How is it possible that is vaguely written?

    >>Dan, are you aware that the first version of the Genesis creation story implies that the world coexisted with god from the beginning, and god just shaped it? Care to offer your take on that?

    You read, Genesis 1:1 "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth", differently then I do then.

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  24. Ouch ericka, touché.

    But...to help you avoid quote mining let's continue the song:

    "But the LORD is with me as a dread warrior;
    therefore my persecutors will stumble;
    they will not overcome me.
    They will be greatly shamed,
    for they will not succeed.
    Their eternal dishonor
    will never be forgotten." ~
    Jeremiah 20:11

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  25. Meatros,

    >>If you can't trust your own reasoning abilities, then how exactly are you supposed to determine *which* revelations of God should be trusted?

    I can trust my own reasoning. If God has revealed to me that I can trust my senses memory and reasoning, then I can make determinations of various things such as revelations of God being trustworthy.

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  26. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  27. Dan
    I can trust my own reasoning. If God has revealed to me that I can trust my senses memory and reasoning, then I can make determinations of various things such as revelations of God being trustworthy.

    Which came first, your "senses" or god's "revelation"? How did he "reveal" to you that you can trust your senses? Do you know that at least some of your senses develp while in the womb? By the time you're born, you have all of them?

    How did this "revelation" happen? Was it independent of your senses?

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  28. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  29. You simply listed a bunch of god-of-the-gaps arguments without justification for the assumption that a god exists in the first place.

    For Dan: Try replacing "God" with any other imaginary noun and run through the arguments you posted. You'll note that they work equally well. This is because they make assumptions which are not crucial to the argument.

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  30. "But the LORD is with me as a dread warrior;
    therefore my persecutors will stumble;
    they will not overcome me.
    They will be greatly shamed,
    for they will not succeed.
    Their eternal dishonor
    will never be forgotten."


    So not just a liar, but a violent one as well, who is apparently also perfectly capable of abandoning his chosen at the slightest transgression.

    You read, Genesis 1:1 "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth", differently then I do then.

    Depends on the translation, I guess. The one I have in front of me right now has been variously rendered both as you've given here, and as, "In the beginning, when God began to create the universe, the earth was formless and desolate..."

    Doesn't really speak of precision, does it, when your "divine revelations" can be translated and interpreted to mean various things.

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  31. JD Curtis said...

    Hey Reynold,

    Can we expect an appearance by one of your other multiple internet personalities, or are they "sleeping" right now?

    "They"? Cool. List ALL of them.

    Can I expect you to not be a coward for once, and to actually let my comment pass? Here, let me refresh your little mind. I stored it here.

    While you're at it, can I expect you to back up your accusation of internet harrassment?

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  32. Dan Wrote:I can trust my own reasoning.

    So you depart from your presuppositional brethren then?

    Dan Wrote:If God has revealed to me that I can trust my senses memory and reasoning, then I can make determinations of various things such as revelations of God being trustworthy.

    And how would you know if God has done so? How do you know if it's God or a delusion?

    This is the whole question I am bringing up. That said, it appears as though you believe that humans can reason autonomously - is this correct?

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  33. My second debate with Sye Tenbruggencate about Presuppositional Apologetics was recorded today at Premier Christian Radio. It will be broadcast on Saturday 19th or 26th March.

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  34. >>It [second debate with Sye Tenbruggencate about Presuppositional Apologetics] will be broadcast on Saturday 19th or 26th March [at Premier Christian Radio].

    Thanks Paul for the reminder. I await with baited breath. Should I give my condolences now? :7)

    No, I will wait, I don't want to be too presumptuous.

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  35. Reynold,

    >>How did this "revelation" happen? Was it independent of your senses?

    I really have no clue. I know that being an omniscient and omnipotent being, God could reveal things to us, such that we can be certain of them. Do you disagree?

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  36. Christopher,

    >>For Dan: Try replacing "God" with any other imaginary noun and run through the arguments you posted. You'll note that they work equally well. This is because they make assumptions which are not crucial to the argument.

    If you have a belief then let's discuss it. If you wish to inject Thor or the Flying Spaghetti Monster then by all means lets reason it out if those are indeed your beliefs. But to quote Van Til, "We shall limit our discussion, then, to the "God of Christianity." I believe, while you do not believe or are not sure that you do believe, in this particular kind of God. That will give point to our discussion. For surely there is no sense in talking about the existence of God, without knowing what kind of God it is who may or may not exist.

    So much then we have gained. We at least know in general what sort of God we are going to make the subject for our conversation. If now we can come to a similar preliminary agreement as to the standard or test by which to prove or disprove God's existence, we can proceed." ~Why I Believe in God

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  37. DD,

    >>The one I have in front of me right now has been variously rendered both as you've given here, and as, "In the beginning, when God began to create the universe, the earth was formless and desolate..."

    You might want to try a different Bible then. As far as the different translations, there is a sliding scale so I take all of them into account and not trust any 'one' thing that man has done. I do reference Strong's Concordance also to help me understand the original texts. I stay close to literal and conservative as possible. The translations start from very conservative and literal translations like Young's Literal, Darby then to KJV then on up to the top (or bottom in my perspective) of the more modern and liberal translations like NLT, NASB, and the most liberal New Jerusalem Bible (NJB). I do not even bother with, imho blasphemous, paraphrased bibles like "The Living Bible."

    If you studied the Hebrew lexicon then you will see what it plainly says. Translate this:

    בראשית ברא אלוהים את השמים ואת הארץ

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  38. Meatros,

    >>And how would you know if God has done so? How do you know if it's God or a delusion?

    It would take intellectual dishonesty to claim that God could not reveal some things to us such that we could know them for certain.

    >>That said, it appears as though you believe that humans can reason autonomously - is this correct?

    Again, I am not saying that atheists do not reason, all I am saying is that they have no basis for assuming that their reasoning is valid, yet they make that assumption. Without presupposing God, the position of the atheist is reduced to absurdity.

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  39. >>If you have a belief then let's discuss it. If you wish to inject Thor or the Flying Spaghetti Monster then by all means lets reason it out if those are indeed your beliefs.

    Alright then, examples follow:

    "The only way then for man to have any knowledge of either temporal or eternal things is for A Flying Monkey to think for us in eternal categories and reveal to us the Measure of truth we can fathom. Thus we hold that Flying Monkey-ism is the only alternative to skepticism.
    We must not argue as though we can already know a great deal about nature by itself but that, inasmuch as we cannot know all that ought to be known about it, there must be one who knows infinitely more than we do. We must rather reason that unless A Flying Monkey exists as ultimate, as self-subsistent, we could not even know anything; we could not even reason that A Flying Monkey must exist, nor could we even ask a question about The Flying Monkey.
    The Flying Monkey-ist, therefore, using his point of contact, observes to the non-Flying Monkey-ist that if the world were not what Scripture says it is, if the natural man’s knowledge were not actually rooted in the creation and providence of The Flying Monkey, then there could be no knowledge whatsoever."

    I for one am totally convinced that a flying monkey is the basis of all knowledge. The above thesis proves it. How could I have ever been in doubt? In seriousness, the insertion of god is a non sequitur to the argument.

    Addressing the following item you mentioned:
    >>One of the most interesting points, that we even have been struggling with here, is “Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism.” (EEAN) "The basic idea behind EAAN is simple enough to grasp: if one believes that humans are the product of undirected naturalistic evolutionary processes, one thereby has good reason to doubt the deliverances of one’s own mind — including, of course, the belief that humans are the product of undirected naturalistic evolutionary processes. This belief is thus irrational, since it is self-defeating."

    It's actually a half-truth. Our minds are evolved, and consequently imperfect. However it is not because evolution must produce an inferior mind, as natural selection requires a successful solution to a particular problem, the mind will simply be a thrifty solution to that problem (survival). The full truth is that we do not rely purely on our minds for truth. We developed methods external to ourselves to evaluate truth and fact. So yes, evolution undermines our ability to have perfect knowledge and reasoning, that is why we found a way to overcome that limitation. Why do you, on the other hand, advocate using your evolved mind in a way that doesn't correct for its flaws? I speak of course of divine revolution (listening to voices in your head) and emotional reasoning (subjective answers). Your position for advocating the above argument must be that you acknowledge our limitations, but seek to do nothing about them (since you seem to encourage the use of divine revelation, but decry the use of the scientific method). If you actually do not believe that our minds are the product of naturalistic evolution, then your argument doesn't matter because in your view our minds must be perfect, and so our scientific reasoning must be perfect as well, and it says that we evolved.

    In your systematic argument:
    >>(6) Therefore, if metaphysical naturalism is the case, then no (human) person
    has knowledge.
    (7) But some (human) persons do have knowledge; therefore, metaphysical
    naturalism is not the case.
    (8) Therefore, given the implausibility of other alternatives, theism is the case.

    These are wrong. Natural evolution does not posit that design doesn't exist, just that it is unguided design towards a particular solution (survival). Therefore we are capable of knowing as that was part of our evolutionary design. However, what isn't accounted for is our ability to know using devices external to us. Number eight is just a false dichotomy.

    ReplyDelete
  40. Dan +†+ said...

    Reynold,

    >>How did this "revelation" happen? Was it independent of your senses?


    I really have no clue.
    How can you have no clue? Aren't you the one who was supposed to have experienced this "revelation"? Seriously, huh?

    I know that being an omniscient and omnipotent being, God could reveal things to us, such that we can be certain of them. Do you disagree?
    Unless you can give us at least some details of this "revelation", we have no evidence that this revelation occurred, therefore, no evidence for the existence for this "omniscient, blah blah" being in the first place.

    Saying that something is possible is entirely different than saying that something is true.

    I just read a post which may explain some of JD's idiocy here.

    ReplyDelete
  41. Dan wrote:

    "No, I will wait, I don't want to be too presumptuous."

    Listen and judge for yourself. :-)

    ReplyDelete
  42. Dan +†+ said... (to Meatros)

    It would take intellectual dishonesty to claim that God could not reveal some things to us such that we could know them for certain.

    Of course it's an even more breathtaking act of intellectual dishonesty to claim such a revelation has happened whilst refusing to make any attempt to back up said claim...

    Are you omniscient Dan? If not how can you be certain of anything, especially the alleged revelation you claim as the basis for your entire argument?

    ReplyDelete
  43. Dan Wrote: It would take intellectual dishonesty to claim that God could not reveal some things to us such that we could know them for certain.

    ?

    You are simply begging the question here. How do we know this? How do we know that the the gospel of Mark is a true revelation as opposed to the infancy gospel - if we cannot reason autonomously?

    Dan Wrote: Again, I am not saying that atheists do not reason, all I am saying is that they have no basis for assuming that their reasoning is valid, yet they make that assumption. Without presupposing God, the position of the atheist is reduced to absurdity.

    Yes, I realize what you are saying - which is why you have to justify your basis for believing your reasoning is valid. I've pointed out that you cannot and all you've done is simply reassert that you can. That's not good enough since I've reduced your position to absurdity by pointing out that you have to presuppose that you can reason autonomously (apart from God) in order to know which revelations are genuine.

    freddies_dead Wrote: Of course it's an even more breathtaking act of intellectual dishonesty to claim such a revelation has happened whilst refusing to make any attempt to back up said claim...

    Are you omniscient Dan? If not how can you be certain of anything, especially the alleged revelation you claim as the basis for your entire argument?


    Dan is being intellectually inconsistent. He wants to say that atheists have no reason to trust their ability to reason, whereas Christians do because they have the revealed word of God on their side.

    The problem is that such a position presupposes that we can trust our ability to reason (we = humans, not just Christians) since if we couldn't then we couldn't know which revelations were actually from God or not.

    ReplyDelete
  44. Christopher,

    >> In seriousness, the insertion of god is a non sequitur to the argument.

    Wrong. As its clearly stated here in this post, you cannot make sense of things outside of God. Also, you bring up logical fallacies as if you thought logic was absolute. In a Christian worldview we have a foundation for unchangeable, repeatable, universal reason because it flows directly from the nature of God. You do not. None of the other religions, including your actual one, provide the precondition of intelligibility. You cannot account for that AT ALL as all you have is randomness, matter and motion. That is it for your atheistic worldview. You cannot account for any laws whatsoever. I would ask you to try to be more consistent with your professed worldview, but rather I urge you to repent of it.

    >>However it is not because evolution must produce an inferior mind, as natural selection requires a successful solution to a particular problem, the mind will simply be a thrifty solution to that problem (survival).

    So the goal for nature is survival (procreation)?

    >>I speak of course of divine revolution (listening to voices in your head) and emotional reasoning (subjective answers).

    You speak as if you believe that divine revolution equates to voices in your head? Is that what you believe? There are natural and special revelations, and all of them have nothing to do with voices in your head.

    >>but decry the use of the scientific method

    Wrong again. I do not decry the scientific method at all. The problem is the unbeliever has no justification for saying the future will be like the past. The Christians would say that we have a sovereign God who controls the universe who allows us to do science and such.

    "As far as science goes, science is dependent on the uniformity of nature, or no scientific prediction could be made. Problem is, no atheistic worldview can account for the uniformity of nature, the very foundation of science."

    >>Natural evolution does not posit that design doesn't exist, just that it is unguided design towards a particular solution (survival).

    Dude, "unguided design" is an oxymoron of sorts. Also, an unguided missile is not controlled after launch. So your postulation of " towards a particular solution" is GUIDED. You do not see how illogical your points are? Without presupposing God, the position of the atheist is reduced to absurdity, as evidenced here.

    >>Therefore we are capable of knowing as that was part of our evolutionary design.

    Evolutionary design? These terms you are using are cracking me up.

    >>Number eight is just a false dichotomy.

    In light of your explanation? Hardly.

    ReplyDelete
  45. Reynold,

    >>Unless you can give us at least some details of this "revelation", we have no evidence that this revelation occurred, therefore, no evidence for the existence for this "omniscient, blah blah" being in the first place.

    The Bible is certainly one revelation. And like the record player says, while the Bible is my ultimate authority, it is not the only means by which God has revealed Himself to us. It is through God's collective natural and special revelation that I know for certain my senses are reliable and can account for absolute, immaterial, universal laws of logic and reason. *scratch* pop* click*

    >>Saying that something is possible is entirely different than saying that something is true.

    I sure hope you are not claiming that the Bible does not exist, or merely possibly exists. Talk about atheistic absurdity.

    ReplyDelete
  46. Freddies Dead,

    >>Are you omniscient Dan?

    Well, I have access to an omniscient mind's revelations. You?


    >>If not how can you be certain of anything, especially the alleged revelation you claim as the basis for your entire argument?

    Exactly, if not then how can YOU? You fully admit that in order to have knowledge of any sort you must be, or have access to, omniscience. God satisfies that requirement and its verified through His Word. Yet you still resist. Why?

    ReplyDelete
  47. Dan Wrote: Wrong. As its clearly stated here in this post, you cannot make sense of things outside of God.

    This is a bare assertion. As I've pointed out, you are borrowing intellectual capital *in order* to 'make sense of things' with God. Necessarily so.

    Dan Wrote: The problem is the unbeliever has no justification for saying the future will be like the past.

    This is nonsense, pragmaticism is one justification. More importantly, this criticism can be more accurately leveled at you, since you believe that God can and does interject himself into the natural world - thereby destroying the uniformity of nature.

    Why demand that the atheist account for the uniformity of nature when you don't actually believe nature is uniform!

    Dan Wrote: The Christians would say that we have a sovereign God who controls the universe who allows us to do science and such.

    And how does the Christian justify that this sovereign God will, in the future, allow you to do science and such? Is it because of his past behavior and actions....?

    You are skewered on your own 'sword' here.

    Dan Wrote: The Bible is certainly one revelation.

    And without autonomous reasoning you cannot appeal to the bible...

    Dan Wrote: And like the record player says, while the Bible is my ultimate authority, it is not the only means by which God has revealed Himself to us.

    Logically this cannot be so, since you have to determine what constitutes 'the bible' and how to interpret it. Your own reason is your final authority.

    Dan Wrote: It is through God's collective natural and special revelation that I know for certain my senses are reliable

    Human senses are not absolutely reliable. They deceive us on many occasions. Are you asserting that you have some sort of special senses that are not the same as the rest of the human race?

    Dan Wrote: and can account for absolute, immaterial, universal laws of logic and reason.

    When you speak of 'laws of logic', which system of logic are you referring to? You realize that the big three (identity, non contradiction, excluded middle) are not *universal* in logical systems, right?

    Your statement here seems to ignore all but classical logic.

    Dan Wrote: Well, I have access to an omniscient mind's revelations. You?

    How do you know this?

    ReplyDelete
  48. Meatros,

    >>How do we know that the the gospel of Mark is a true revelation as opposed to the infancy gospel - if we cannot reason autonomously?

    I am sure you would concede that God can preserve His Word. But the two (gospel of Mark and infancy gospel) are not exclusively separate are they? I have read the infancy gospel, it didn't flow as the Bible did. I just looked it up and saw the reference to how Quranic (sp? Qu'ran) it was instead of Biblical. In other words it was obvious. This is not autonomous reasoning. The reference is still God's Word.

    >>The problem is that such a position presupposes that we can trust our ability to reason (we = humans, not just Christians) since if we couldn't then we couldn't know which revelations were actually from God or not.

    Yes, you can trust your reasoning, but its because of God. If you try to account for your valid reasoning you have no avenue to knowing anything. To know anything you must have a path to omniscience. How do you know what you know will not be altered with new revelations of facts in the future? So, in a sense, you know nothing within your worldview of no God (Atheistic). We do know things, therefore God.

    Our appeal to God's Omniscience gives us knowledge of things revealed to us.

    ReplyDelete
  49. Something is up with the posting on this blog - I posted a post earlier and it still is not showing up. The post counter is 51 on the face page and 45 on the comment page. So there is a lag. I had responded to an earlier post of yours (and it's not showing up), so I'm just going to wait on it. Hopefully it'll show up and you can respond to it when it does. That said:

    Dan Wrote: I am sure you would concede that God can preserve His Word.

    I wouldn't concede that until I knew what precisely you meant by it. That said, there would still be a disconnect between what God's word is and my understanding/knowledge of that word. That is the question I am repeatedly hammering you with.

    Dan Wrote: But the two (gospel of Mark and infancy gospel) are not exclusively separate are they?

    Meaning what? Your next sentence (after this quote) isn't helping me interpret this. What do you mean by this? They both refer to Jesus, if that's what you mean.

    Dan Wrote: I have read the infancy gospel, it didn't flow as the Bible did.

    That's subjective, but beside the point really. You could not trust your ability to reason (and therefore your opinion that the infancy gospel did not flow).

    Dan Wrote: I just looked it up and saw the reference to how Quranic (sp? Qu'ran) it was instead of Biblical. In other words it was obvious. This is not autonomous reasoning. The reference is still God's Word.

    Not sure what you mean by 'Quranic', but whatever.

    You cannot appeal to 'obviousness' since to do so would be to appeal to your own authority. The question is, how can you determine what is God's word apart from your own authority?

    Dan Wrote: Yes, you can trust your reasoning, but its because of God.

    How so? I know you believe this, the question is, how can you rationally believe this?

    There is a bigger question of if this is true, then what sense does it make to say we are 'fallen' creatures (epistemically speaking)...

    Dan Wrote: If you try to account for your valid reasoning you have no avenue to knowing anything.

    Well, I wouldn't say that - but that's not the point I'm making that you seem to be missing. My point is that (assuming the above is correct) neither do you, since you have to presuppose autonomous reasoning. You deny this, but you have not given a reasonable account. You simply assert that this is not the case.

    Dan Wrote: To know anything you must have a path to omniscience.

    Not according to your logic. According to your logic, you have to be omniscient. How can you 'follow the path' if you don't know where the path is?

    Dan Wrote: How do you know what you know will not be altered with new revelations of facts in the future?

    I don't hold knowledge with certainty, so there is no need for me to do this. You on the other hand, seem to claim this. The problem is that you cannot justify it.

    Dan Wrote: So, in a sense, you know nothing within your worldview of no God (Atheistic). We do know things, therefore God.

    No, you assume things which are contradicted by your worldview, as I've repeatedly shown. You need to post how you know what is and is not part of God's revelation apart from your own reasoning since as you've said mankind cannot justify his own reasoning.

    Dan Wrote: Our appeal to God's Omniscience gives us knowledge of things revealed to us.

    How so? You continue to assert it. Please demonstrate it.

    ReplyDelete
  50. I just want to hammer this home, since it's central to what I'm saying. Dan, you wrote:

    To know anything you must have a path to omniscience.

    If you cannot know anything then how can you know which path to take?

    Remember, according to you, you have to somehow be on the correct path before you can reason about which path to take.

    So how do we get on the correct path without reason?

    ReplyDelete
  51. Meatros,

    The problem is the unbeliever has no justification for saying the future will be like the past.

    >>This is nonsense, pragmaticism is one justification.

    Pragmatism also fails in that one needs to know the proper function of a thing before one can determine if it works or not, the very thing that pragmatism cannot give you.

    >> More importantly, this criticism can be more accurately leveled at you, since you believe that God can and does interject himself into the natural world - thereby destroying the uniformity of nature. Why demand that the atheist account for the uniformity of nature when you don't actually believe nature is uniform!

    Destroying? Did God’s nature change when He performed miracles? Its quite natural to have miracles from God. The laws of nature are created by God. In fact, God’s promises for uniformity in nature are only for as long as the earth endures (Genesis 8:22).

    Uniformity of nature, like time, is for our benefit though. Its something that is not necessary for God. God can manipulate nature because He created it. Hence, His omnipotence. So you're right God can destroy the uniformity of Nature and the ONLY way we can KNOW is by His REVELATION. You have no such avenue, no justification, for saying the future will be like the past unless you latch onto, like a parasite does to the host, the reasoning of my worldview, and appeal to God.

    >>And how does the Christian justify that this sovereign God will, in the future, allow you to do science and such? Is it because of his past behavior and actions....?

    Again, God's REVELATION is our avenue to such knowledge and NOTHING else.

    >>And without autonomous reasoning you cannot appeal to the bible...

    Are you certain of this? If so, how are you certain of it? If not, you have no argument.

    Ref: the Bible is my ultimate authority

    >>Logically this cannot be so, since you have to determine what constitutes 'the bible' and how to interpret it. Your own reason is your final authority.

    Are you certain of this? If so, how are you certain of it? If not, you have no argument. Let me help you out though. Read: Proverbs 3:5-6, John 14:26, John 8:31-32, 1 John 4:6, 1 John 2:27

    You see, our hearts are deceitfully wicked and cannot be relied on.(Jeremiah 17:9)

    >>Human senses are not absolutely reliable. They deceive us on many occasions. Are you asserting that you have some sort of special senses that are not the same as the rest of the human race?

    You are committing the fallacy of a “hasty generalization.” To claim that senses can never be reliable because they sometimes are not reliable is a logical fallacy. In fact to claim that senses are sometimes unreliable presupposes that they are sometimes reliable or you could not make the claim.

    Well, I have access to an omniscient mind's revelations.

    >>How do you know this?

    God's Revelation

    You?

    >>*crickets

    ReplyDelete
  52. Meatros,

    The rest can be answered simply with:

    >>So how do we get on the correct path without reason?

    Again, its with reason but that reason is the gift from God. REVELATION will let you know the correct path. Its getting redundant, I know.

    Anything else? Ready to repent and trust in Jesus?

    Salvation is not just for the next life Meatros - Not only did Christ's death and resurrection save souls for eternity, it saves our reasoning now. Again, I beg you to repent and turn from rejecting the God you know exists, and accept the free gift of Jesus Christ's payment for your sins, so that you might be saved from Hell, spend an eternity with God, AND have a firm foundation for your reasoning NOW.

    ReplyDelete
  53. Dan +†+ said...

    Reynold,

    Unless you can give us at least some details of this "revelation", we have no evidence that this revelation occurred, therefore, no evidence for the existence for this "omniscient, blah blah" being in the first place.


    The Bible is certainly one revelation.
    Unless god "beamed" the bible into your skull while you were still in the womb, you can't use the bible itself as the revelation that lets you know that you can trust your senses, because you have to use your senses to read the bible in the first place.

    You're going to need some other "revelation".

    And like the record player says, while the Bible is my ultimate authority, it is not the only means by which God has revealed Himself to us. It is through God's collective natural and special revelation
    Which you NEVER get around to detailing or describing as opposed to just asserting (ie. pulling out of your ass)...

    ...that I know for certain my senses are reliable and can account for absolute, immaterial, universal laws of logic and reason. *scratch* pop* click*
    And like a broken record, Dan just goes around in circles, refusing, or unable to give any evidence other than just his own say-so that he got some sort of "special revelation".

    Saying that something is possible is entirely different than saying that something is true.
    I sure hope you are not claiming that the Bible does not exist, or merely possibly exists.
    No worries, I'm not talking about the bible at all here: after all, it can only be percieved through our senses, can't it?

    I'm talking about your "god" him/herself, and what this "special revelation" is supposed to be.

    Talk about atheistic absurdity.
    At this point, I wouldn't talk if I was you.

    ReplyDelete
  54. "Firm foundation for your reasoning"? Are you screwy? All you do is either run around in circles or make blind assumptions that you can't back up! Example of the assumption being that so-called "special revelation" that you assert that biblegod gave you.

    You don't bother to describe it even.

    Bottom line: Without the bible, which you need your senses to read anyway, neither you nor anyone else would have heard of your god. It's only through the bible that you hear of Jesus and gang (and those who push the bible on others, of course).

    The only exceptions would be the clowns who made that book (or series of books) up in the first place, just like is done for any other religion).

    ReplyDelete
  55. I was promised juicy nuggets of logic...I'm disappointed. I'm not sure what atheists you've encountered who couldn't reason through these 'nuggets of logic', but certainly here just amongst these few comments it's become clearly obvious how lacking of logic these 'nuggets' have proved to be.

    ReplyDelete
  56. I'm assuming P(R/N&E) is meant as an mathematical function, as in f(x/y)?

    Then all arguments based on it are correct assuming you can derive every single argument back to the original f(x/y) (which you cannot because a lot of the points are questions of how you define a word, and therefore based on yet another assumption which may or may not be correct.)

    For P(R/N&E) to be correct in the first place, you must be able to prove it. Prove the equation using any other currently accepted law.

    (Also "you can't prove it isn't" is not viable in mathematics, otherwise I'd have aced all my maths exams)

    ReplyDelete
  57. I'm assuming P(R/N&E) is meant as an mathematical function, as in f(x/y)?

    Then all arguments based on it are correct assuming you can derive every single argument back to the original f(x/y) (which you cannot because a lot of the points are questions of how you define a word, and therefore based on yet another assumption which may or may not be correct.)

    For P(R/N&E) to be correct in the first place, you must be able to prove it. Prove the equation using any other currently accepted law.

    (Also "you can't prove it isn't" is not viable in mathematics, otherwise I'd have aced all my maths exams)

    ReplyDelete
  58. I'm assuming P(R/N&E) is meant as an mathematical function, as in f(x/y)?

    Then all arguments based on it are correct assuming you can derive every single argument back to the original f(x/y) (which you cannot because a lot of the points are questions of how you define a word, and therefore based on yet another assumption which may or may not be correct.)

    For P(R/N&E) to be correct in the first place, you must be able to prove it. Prove the equation using any other currently accepted law.

    (Also "you can't prove it isn't" is not viable in mathematics, otherwise I'd have aced all my maths exams)

    ReplyDelete
  59. Dan +†+ said...

    Freddies Dead,

    >>Are you omniscient Dan?

    Well, I have access to an omniscient mind's revelations. You?

    I'll take that as a no. In which case, how do you know you have access to omniscience? Careful Dan, you might end up disappearing up your own revelation.

    >>If not how can you be certain of anything, especially the alleged revelation you claim as the basis for your entire argument?

    Exactly, if not then how can YOU?

    Agreeing that you can't be certain sans omniscience and then dodging the question ... lol. Duly noted. This is not about my certainty but instead is about you supporting your claim to such. You seem to be reticent to even try, why is that?

    You fully admit that in order to have knowledge of any sort you must be, or have access to, omniscience.

    No Dan, that is your position. I simply pointed out that merely claiming access to omniscience isn't the same as demonstrating that you actually have access to omniscience and that without being omniscient yourself your claim to be certain that you'd received a revelation is just so much horseshit. You wouldn't even be able to tell whether your certainty was the result of revelation from an omniscient entity or a brainfart thanks to ingesting strong cheese. You are, of course, welcome to demonstrate the truth of your claims any time you feel able.

    God satisfies that requirement and its verified through His Word.

    Your God satisfies nothing until you can demostrate that He exists. Until you manage that 'His Word' is just a book.

    Yet you still resist. Why?

    Because your argument is crap *shrugs*

    ReplyDelete
  60. Dan Wrote: Pragmatism also fails in that one needs to know the proper function of a thing before one can determine if it works or not, the very thing that pragmatism cannot give you.

    This is incorrect - it just has to work - technically speaking.

    Dan Wrote: Destroying? Did God’s nature change when He performed miracles?

    We aren't talking about God's nature, we are talking about the uniformity of nature. God doing miracles interrupts nature, does it not? So God's nature is not relevant to this.

    Dan Wrote: Its quite natural to have miracles from God.

    In what sense? You are equivocating on 'natural'. When God made the sun stand still (nevermind the language) this would break several uniformities we have observed in nature (namely gravity).

    Dan Wrote: The laws of nature are created by God. In fact, God’s promises for uniformity in nature are only for as long as the earth endures (Genesis 8:22).

    If 'miracles' are natural then the uniformity of nature is incoherent. As to Genesis 8:22, that doesn't guarantee the uniformity of nature - in fact, the miracle of the sun standing still occurs AFTER this. So this clearly cannot be a promise to keep nature uniform.

    Dan Wrote: Uniformity of nature, like time, is for our benefit though. Its something that is not necessary for God. God can manipulate nature because He created it.

    If this is the case then your worldview has no basis on which to trust science AND it's hypocritical to demand the atheist to justify the uniformity of nature when you don't actually believe in it!

    Dan Wrote: Hence, His omnipotence. So you're right God can destroy the uniformity of Nature and the ONLY way we can KNOW is by His REVELATION.

    A revelation we have no rational reason to trust...

    Dan Wrote: You have no such avenue, no justification, for saying the future will be like the past unless you latch onto, like a parasite does to the host, the reasoning of my worldview, and appeal to God.

    I don't need an avenue since you don't actually believe that nature is uniform. Your worldview actually posits an entity which makes the uniformity of nature doubtful - my worldview has no such entity, which makes my worldview superior in that regard.

    Dan Wrote:
    Again, God's REVELATION is our avenue to such knowledge and NOTHING else.


    Ah, so by begging the question. God's revelation will remain the same because it has in the past...

    Again, your worldview falls on the sword that you accuse my worldview of suffering from.

    Dan Wrote: Are you certain of this? If so, how are you certain of it? If not, you have no argument.

    Yes, I am certain since your worldview cuts off the presupposition that you use in order to justify it. Hence it's logically contradictory. It, literally, cannot be the truth in any possible world.

    ReplyDelete
  61. Dan Wrote: Ref: the Bible is my ultimate authority

    Logically impossible, as has been shown. How do you know what constitutes the bible or what the bible says without ultimately relying on your own autonomous reason?

    You cannot.

    Dan Wrote: Are you certain of this? If so, how are you certain of it? If not, you have no argument. Let me help you out though. Read: Proverbs 3:5-6, John 14:26, John 8:31-32, 1 John 4:6, 1 John 2:27

    I've repeated my argument and you've ignored it. Quoting biblical texts without justifying them is completely missing the point.

    Do you understand the criticism I'm leveling at you? I don't think you do since to quote bible versus only adds to the problem you have.

    Dan Wrote: You see, our hearts are deceitfully wicked and cannot be relied on.(Jeremiah 17:9)

    And if you believe that you effectively collapse your worldview.

    Game.Set.Match. Your worldview collapses under logical contradiction.

    Dan Wrote: You are committing the fallacy of a “hasty generalization.” To claim that senses can never be reliable because they sometimes are not reliable is a logical fallacy.

    I commit no such fallacy - you simply did not read what I wrote - I didn't say that our senses cannot be reliable, just that they are not absolutely reliable.

    Dan Wrote: In fact to claim that senses are sometimes unreliable presupposes that they are sometimes reliable or you could not make the claim.

    Did you actually read what I wrote or are you skimming it? I did claim they are sometimes reliable - this does not mean that I 'cannot make this claim'. You would have to provide an argument for this, you have not done this.

    Dan Wrote: God's Revelation

    How do you know what is God's revelation? You keep saying 'God's revelation' but you have consistently failed to account for it.

    Please do so.

    Dan Wrote: You?

    I don't claim absolute certainty in my worldview - hence there is no need for me to do so.

    In fact, I could simply presuppose all the foundations of my worldview as truth and have just as much rational for believing it as you do yours. The only difference would be that your worldview is internally contradictory, whereas mine has not been shown to be.

    Dan Wrote: Again, its with reason but that reason is the gift from God. REVELATION will let you know the correct path. Its getting redundant, I know.

    This is what is called a baseless assertion. I have asked you to provide a basis for it. You have not done so. I ask you again:

    So how do we get on the correct path without reason?

    How do you know what is God's revelation?

    Please answer me specifically as opposed to simply stating what you believe. Remember you are supposed to be accounting for your worldview, not simply repeating a claim.

    Reynold Wrote: The Bible is certainly one revelation.
    Unless god "beamed" the bible into your skull while you were still in the womb, you can't use the bible itself as the revelation that lets you know that you can trust your senses, because you have to use your senses to read the bible in the first place.


    This is really the meat of it. Dan, you need to read and reread this and then justify how we can trust the bible.

    I would add that you have no basis on which to 'choose' the bible to begin with, but the above by Reynold is sufficient to destroy your worldview.

    Are you ready to become an atheist yet?

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  62. If you studied the Hebrew lexicon then you will see what it plainly says.

    You know, I never got around to studying Hebrew. I suppose I could ask one of my Jewish friends to read some for me, but I suspect they'd put a different slant on it than what you'd like.

    It seems odd that your omnipotent god whom you claim can make you certain of things is apparently unable to produce a foolproof text of his revelations.

    By the way, you never did get around to explaining how a supernatural, immaterial entity can have anything definable as a 'nature'...

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  63. As its clearly stated here in this post, you cannot make sense of things outside of God.

    For 'clearly stated' read 'asserted without foundation'. The thing is, Dan, if your god exists, you are 'outside of God' unless you are claiming that you are god. Unless you first affirm your own existence as a centre of experience, you cannot experience any revelation, and if you don't trust your ability to reason, independently, you could not distinguish an experience of revelation from an experience of intoxication or a dream-state or sundry other delusion. That is the point that you are simply refusing to address.

    I suppose the corrollary to making unsupported assertions is to ignore contrary views without actually providing a reason to dismiss them - but that seems to be part and parcel of the presupper approach.

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  64. Wow, Dan. I've just been reading through your exchange with Meatros, and it's thrown what seems to be your favourite tactic into stark relief. Whenever you're met with a statement - generally a supported one - that you can't answer, you throw out the "are you certain of that" line, as if you have a privileged position of certainty granted by your worldview.

    Well, Dan, here's an important newsflash for you to digest - worldviews are schematics that minds (themselves dependent upon the material reality of matter and energy) construct in order to make sense of experience. What experiences have you had that require you to suppose an immaterial yet materially definable entity in order to explain them?

    In anticipation of your "are you certain of this?" gambit, I will say, no, I'm not certain of it, but it makes sense of my experiences, and you lack the knowledge to claim that it doesn't, since you can't see into my mind.

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  65. DormantDragon Wrote: Wow, Dan. I've just been reading through your exchange with Meatros, and it's thrown what seems to be your favourite tactic into stark relief. Whenever you're met with a statement - generally a supported one - that you can't answer, you throw out the "are you certain of that" line, as if you have a privileged position of certainty granted by your worldview.

    Actually what I believe he's doing is attempting to shift the focus of the debate onto my worldview so that he doesn't have to defend his. He keeps trying to bait us because it seems he's in a tough spot. If he can get the focus off of the rough spots in his worldview he's free to attack ours and ignore the holes in his.

    I find it a little amusing because I'm fine with not clinging to certainty. Am I certain that the world is as I think it is? No, not at all. I suppose God could exist. I could be wrong on a number of things. In fact, I could tell Dan precisely the areas that I'm experiencing significant doubt about (ex. physicality and the mind - property dualism or monism?). That said, he's the one who is perched up there 'debunking atheists' and speaking from certainty. So I think it's only fair that he defend his beliefs. He could be correct, after all. He's not going to get my support by just asserting he is though, he needs to demonstrate it.

    I suspect that you (and others) feel the same.

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  66. Actually what I believe he's doing is attempting to shift the focus of the debate onto my worldview so that he doesn't have to defend his.

    He's been doing this for 2+ years now. If ever there were evidence that Dan is afraid of the failings of his own world view, this blog is it.

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  67. I agree that Dan is generally engaged in diversionary discourse, but I think that's pretty much the presupper approach. It usually consists of applying extreme scepticism to any and all other points of view, and then simply asserting that one doesn't need to do that with Christianity because it has all the answers. Then silence about how any of those answers actually make sense.

    I've been corresponding with Dr Reluctant over on his blog and mine, and he's much better at phrasing an argument than Dan, although the tactics he uses are not substantially different.

    I do think that if one is claiming certainty, one ought to be able to demonstrate it. I've tried to explain the difference between showing and telling, but Dan doesn't seem to have grasped it. He also doesn't get that in order to construct a worldview in the first place, one needs to be able to give credence to one's experiences and one's ability to synthesise them into a holistic picture.

    Oh, well.

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  68. >>Wrong. As its clearly stated here in this post, you cannot make sense of things outside of God.

    That's incorrect. It's actually Flying Monkeys that allow us to make sense of things. My post you replied to proved that much. Of course, if you doubt the power of The Flying Monkeys' ability to give us the ability to make sense of reality, to know, then you have to apply that doubt to god. You can't have both.

    >>Also, you bring up logical fallacies as if you thought logic was absolute.

    Logic IS absolute, within the boundaries of the premises. What do you think mathematics is? A system of logic. You can't just violate logic when it suits you, like above when you decided "God" was the basis for knowing things, but Flying Monkeys could not be. Logic (or rather the non sequitur employed by the logic in the statement you endorsed) permits for ANYTHING to replace god in that "proof" and so if you accept "god" as a valid answer because of it, my flying monkeys must be valid too.

    Why do you think it has been thousands of years yet we have no proof of god? It's because the vast majority of the attempted proofs are non sequiturs, or bare assertions. Our best and brightest minds have attempted the problem, but it apparently cannot be done.

    >>In a Christian worldview we have a foundation for unchangeable, repeatable, universal reason because it flows directly from the nature of God.

    No you don't. You just defer the problem to god. Your immutable authority which you allow as dogma is one big, obvious deferral of an actual, deep philosophical problem.

    Please be honest with yourself and the rest of us. You cannot explain the axiomatic basis for knowledge, indeed for transcendental logic, for truths that exist outside of this universe. None of us can explain them except as axioms, and we most likely will never get beyond this limit.

    >>That is it for your atheistic worldview. You cannot account for any laws whatsoever.

    I treat them as axioms. That is because I do not have a theological axe to grind or need to prove my beliefs to others.

    >>So the goal for nature is survival (procreation)?

    Yes. If it wasn't, the species would end.

    >>There are natural and special revelations, and all of them have nothing to do with voices in your head.

    Voices in your head, imagining significance to improbable events, seeing meaning in a picture, a provocative dream, a wild drug trip. These are all avenues for divine revelation. I may have missed some, but there's a list. The important point is that they all come from yourself, rather your intelligence filtering bits of data.

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  69. >>Wrong again. I do not decry the scientific method at all.

    Do you accept science in its entirety, or reject parts of it like Evolution?

    >>The problem is the unbeliever has no justification for saying the future will be like the past.

    You mean symmetry and supersymmetry?

    >>Problem is, no atheistic worldview can account for the uniformity of nature, the very foundation of science.

    You mean conservation laws? Again, symmetry.

    >>Dude, "unguided design" is an oxymoron of sorts.

    Only if you anthropomorphize the noun.

    >>Also, an unguided missile is not controlled after launch. So your postulation of " towards a particular solution" is GUIDED.

    I was using "guide" with the meaning of step-by-step intervention. There is no plan, no intervention in nature.

    >>Without presupposing God, the position of the atheist is reduced to absurdity, as evidenced here.

    Why not presuppose a genie then? Or a magic orb? We don't need to presuppose unwieldy, unscientific things like this because evolution demonstrates the ability of nature to unintelligently design itself.

    >>Evolutionary design?

    Yes. Unguided design towards a solution of survival because that which doesn't survive is intrinsically culled from the future.

    >>In light of your explanation? Hardly.

    There are more options than just the two enumerated:
    Evolution by natural selection gives us the capacity for knowledge. This was left out and the choice was between a strawman of naturalism and god.

    Some replies you made to others I felt like answering:
    >>Well, I have access to an omniscient mind's revelations. You?

    We all encourage you to prove it. Reveal something that only an omniscient mind could know, but you do not, such as the precise location of Osama Bin Laden. Tell us when the next terrorist attack on an American city will happen, the exact day and minute, and who does it and how they do it.

    Otherwise the only mind you have the revelations of is your own.

    >>Again, its with reason but that reason is the gift from God. REVELATION will let you know the correct path. Its getting redundant, I know.

    So your advice is to listen to the voices in your head, that acid trip you had, and the intuition you have about patterns in text. But using our faculties to reason that god doesn't exist, with logic and evidence, is a big no-no.

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  70. Christopher Wrote:I treat them as axioms. That is because I do not have a theological axe to grind or need to prove my beliefs to others.

    There's a few problems with Dan's position, regarding logic. For one thing, the 'laws of logic' are not applicable to all logical theories. For instance, the law of bivalence (excluded middle) is not axiomatic to fuzzy logic (and others).

    Another problem is that he's treating logical laws as both necessary AND contingent. You cannot say that the laws of logic are universal and necessary while then saying they depend on God. It's incoherent.

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  71. >>There's a few problems with Dan's position, regarding logic. For one thing, the 'laws of logic' are not applicable to all logical theories. For instance, the law of bivalence (excluded middle) is not axiomatic to fuzzy logic (and others).

    You're right. I completely forgot about fuzzy logic.

    >>Another problem is that he's treating logical laws as both necessary AND contingent. You cannot say that the laws of logic are universal and necessary while then saying they depend on God. It's incoherent.

    It's his need to have the best of both worlds. He wants to say that logic is contingent upon god so that his god can have a reason for existing, but in the same breath he wants to say that his god is logical.

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  72. Christopher,

    >>Logic IS absolute, within the boundaries of the premises.

    That is great. So do you acknowledge there other absolutes in life, like truth and morality, also?

    >>Do you accept science in its entirety, or reject parts of it like Evolution?

    Evolution is not actually science, like gravity or the moon is not science. They are theories. I fully understand that evolution is taken as the paradigm in science though, which is wrong. Its a common misconception. Evolutionary theory artificially rules out a kind of cause before it has a chance to speak by the evidence. Incidentally Science has to be repeatable, verifiable and testable, if you don’t have those three things then it’s not science. Tell me how Macro evolution is testable, repeatable, and verifiable? We need to also bear in mind that anyone who claims science "proves" anything as "true" (like evolution) misunderstands the basic tenets of the scientific method.

    >>We all encourage you to prove it.

    Isn't that quite telling that someone that is so dependent on science is requiring "proof" where science does not provide proof at all. Quite contradictory to your worldview again. Reduced to absurd...again.

    >>Reveal something that only an omniscient mind could know, but you do not, such as the precise location of Osama Bin Laden.

    God is not in your box. He is not subject to your scrutiny. Remember that you are the criminal waiting to be Judged, You are not the Judge. God revealed origins of mankind and the Universe. Showed evidence that what He says will, and have, come to pass. That He is trustworthy. That His Word is entirely scientific and true. That He is indeed the Creator of this Universe. You deny this of course.

    >>So your advice is to listen to the voices in your head, that acid trip you had, and the intuition you have about patterns in text. But using our faculties to reason that god doesn't exist, with logic and evidence, is a big no-no.

    You keep speaking of voices in your head as the ONLY revelation from God. Did you know the Bible itself, is a revelation? Well it is! There are natural and special revelations from God so that we can know with certainty who He is and that he exists. That brings us back to the cartoon.

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  73. Fuzzy logic and multiverses (multiple universes) only exist in the mind of Atheists. That's understandable because of the mental gymnastics to justify their beliefs and worldview. Bayesian probability, on the other hand, is more of a move to reality.

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  74. Dan
    You keep speaking of voices in your head as the ONLY revelation from God. Did you know the Bible itself, is a revelation? Well it is!
    Too bad that you need to use your senses to find and read it though, eh? Remember, you claimed that it's "revelation" from god that let you know that you can trust your senses in the first place.

    So, can you give us any evidence that the other, non-biblical "revelation" happened?

    Also, is it my mistake, or did you only get onto this "god gave you special revelation that lets me know that I can trust my senses and is the basis for logic" crap only after you first ran into Sye TenB?

    Did you ever make any such claims before then?

    There are natural and special revelations from God so that we can know with certainty who He is and that he exists. That brings us back to the cartoon.
    Which brings me back to testimonials of former YECers who went into the field and as a result, lost their belief in YECism.

    Real life is kind of the opposite of that cartoon.

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  75. I forgot to mention Dan, but that cartoon does not show how nature can show us who god is, contrary to what you just claimed.

    Even is one believed in a designer, just looking around does NOT tell you anything about who, what, or how many "designers" there are.

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  76. - Logic IS absolute, within the boundaries of the premises.

    That is great. So do you acknowledge there other absolutes in life, like truth and morality, also?


    I think you missed the point there, Dan. Within the boundaries of the premises the laws of logic hold, provided they are agreed upon by those who use them and applicable to the situation. But the premises themselves are what determine whether you'll arrive at truth using logical steps. If your premises are baloney (and let's face it, quite a few of yours are) then logic will yield conclusions that are likewise baloney.

    Logic is a temporal construct designed to allow humans to understand how arguments work. It will yield true conclusions if you begin with true premises...provided there are no grey areas. Classical logic doesn't recognise degrees of truth or falsehood - everything has to be one or the other. Fuzzy logic is designed to accommodate degrees of truth, and the imprecision of ordinary language.

    So there are indeed degrees of truth. Truth, insofar as we are able to establish it, is not absolute in the sense that it will hold for all time in all possible worlds. Even if we discovered such a truth, how would we know that we had?

    Paul Baird pointed out, with regard to morality, that it has the same temporal, changeable nature because humans are likewise temporal and changeable. Let's use the "is it always wrong to sexually molest babies?" favourite (obviously theists can't resort to "is it always wrong to slaughter babies?" because clearly it wasn't wrong, by their standards, when their god ordered the Israelites to slaughter Canaanite babies). Babies are not absolute entities. The wrongness of sexually molesting them is contingent upon their existence as innocent sentient beings, able to be harmed by such an action.

    Your problem, Dan, seems to be that you think the only alternatives are absoluteness or arbitrariness, when in fact there is a great deal of ground in between them. Just because something isn't always true (or always false, as the case may be) doesn't mean that in certain circumstances, it won't be true (or false) because it isn't so in other circumstances. As one of my English professors remarked, you can say that Hamlet is about many things, but you'd be hard pressed to make the case that it's about strawberry jam.

    Evolution is not actually science, like gravity or the moon is not science. They are theories. I fully understand that evolution is taken as the paradigm in science though, which is wrong. Its a common misconception. Evolutionary theory artificially rules out a kind of cause before it has a chance to speak by the evidence. [Some gobbledegook about the 'rules' of science]

    Aww, look at you on your little soapbox, being all sanctimonious and patronising and pretending that you're speaking to people who don't understand how science works. Scientists "test" evolutionary hypotheses by making predictions and observing what happens in the field and in the lab to see if the predictions are borne out. Scientific research ain't all lab coats and test tubes. Repeatability simply means that other scientists, given the same set of circumstances and following the same procedures, should make the same or nearly the same observations.

    No-one here is claiming that science "proves" that something is the case. It deals in likelihoods and plausibility. More important that verifiability is falsifiability. If a hypothesis survives many attempts to falsify it, it gains strength. Evolutionary theory is one of the strongest and most powerfully explanatory pictures that science has ever built of how the world really works.

    And how, oh wise science guru, is natural science to be expected to explain anything that is claimed to be supernatural and nonphysical? The fact is that an entity that is invisible, undetectable, immaterial and undefinable looks an awful lot like an entity that is nonexistent.

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  77. I think you missed the point there, Dan

    There's a difference between missing it and ignoring it :p

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  78. I just noticed you posted biblical Hebrew.

    בראשית ברא אלוהים את השמים ואת הארץ

    Barashit barah elohim et hashamayim zet

    Which roughly means "In-beginning created elohim the-skies..."

    I can't quite recall it perfectly. It was years ago since I used to study it.

    >>That is great. So do you acknowledge there other absolutes in life, like truth and morality, also?

    It depends on your definition of truth. Truth itself is a very deep philosophical topic, with many different schools of thought, some of which don't even hold that it exists. If truth is merely another word for fact, then we may call it conditionally true because every observed fact of this universe is contingent on it existing, which is not forever. If we are talking about abstract facts, then they may well be absolute, as in existing independent of this universe.

    Morality is something different. There are no absolute morals because there is no objective morality to base it upon. Even infanticide isn't absolutely immoral, as anyone who has spent time observing animals can tell you.

    >>Tell me how Macro evolution is testable, repeatable, and verifiable?

    So then you reject parts of science which do not fit your preconceptions.
    I can't tell you how many times I have posted the following in answer to a question like yours, but I can tell you how many people learned from it afterwards: zero. Maybe you will be different?
    http://www.pnas.org/content/96/18/10254.long

    >>We need to also bear in mind that anyone who claims science "proves" anything as "true" (like evolution) misunderstands the basic tenets of the scientific method.

    When a person says that science has proven something, they often use the colloquial meaning of the word, not the mathematical one. In other words, they mean that science has provided a strong enough case that any other explanation is so unlikely that it may safely be ignored.

    >>Isn't that quite telling that someone that is so dependent on science is requiring "proof" where science does not provide proof at all. Quite contradictory to your worldview again. Reduced to absurd...again.

    So what you're telling me is that you have no proof and are therefore making bold claims that you know cannot be proven. That's brazen.

    >>God is not in your box. He is not subject to your scrutiny. Remember that you are the criminal waiting to be Judged, You are not the Judge.

    Again, you are just telling me in a roundabout way that you cannot back your claim with proof. Why should I believe you then? Why should anyone believe someone who says that they have a connection to the mind of god but cannot prove it?

    >>You keep speaking of voices in your head as the ONLY revelation from God. Did you know the Bible itself, is a revelation? Well it is!

    The bible is a compilation of oral stories written down, thoughts, prayers and poetry; much of it came from people who seem like they were on drugs, or schizophrenic (a bush on "fire" telling you to liberate slaves? That sounds like Moses was off his medication).

    >>That brings us back to the cartoon.

    And still no proof, after thousands of years.

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  79. It's not directly related to the topic, but more of a reply to Dan's cartoon:

    https://www.answersingenesis.org/aftereden/cartoons/20000626.gif

    Are you sure you want to be endorsing a website that makes cartoons like these?

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  80. Christopher wrote It depends on your definition of truth.

    Depends more heavily on the definition of "absolute", IMHO...

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  81. I think you missed the point there, Dan

    There's a difference between missing it and ignoring it :p


    And, of course, one who does the latter is far more intellectually culpable than one who does the former. Given that Dan's biblical worldview requires him to deny a sizeable chunk of reality in order to claim that it's true whilst avoiding cognitive dissonance, I suspect he's quite the accomplished ignorer...

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  82. Dan Wrote:Fuzzy logic and multiverses (multiple universes) only exist in the mind of Atheists.

    Um...*WHAT*?

    Are you serious? For a start, there are multiple systems of logic that do not require the '3' laws of thought, fuzzy logic was the first that I thought of.

    That said, if you think that the three laws of thought are absolute, then please, answer this:

    This sentence is false.

    Is the sentence above true or false? By the law of bivalence, it has to be one or the other. So please answer and justify your answer.

    Dan Wrote:That's understandable because of the mental gymnastics to justify their beliefs and worldview. Bayesian probability, on the other hand, is more of a move to reality.

    This doesn't make any sense - different systems of logic apply to different things. Things in classical logic (Aristotelian), are invalid in propositional logic, for instance.

    Do you also think that relevance logic and/or paraconsistent logic is simply 'atheist logic'?? There are several multivalued logics out there.

    Please give a rational reason for dismissing them. Simply denying that they exist because you don't want to admit you are wrong is not a valid reason.

    I've asked you the following a few times and you keep dodging it. Please answer the following:

    So how do we get on the correct path without reason?

    How do you know what is God's revelation?

    Please answer me specifically as opposed to simply stating what you believe. Remember you are supposed to be accounting for your worldview, not simply repeating a claim.

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  83. Meatros said...

    Please answer me specifically as opposed to simply stating what you believe. Remember you are supposed to be accounting for your worldview, not simply repeating a claim.

    Meatros, unfortunately Dan has already shouted "quick over there, rape, abortion, horror!", and moved on so it's unlikely he'll make any attempt to actually answer your questions. However, it won't be long before he repeats the same tired claims and you'll get the chance to ask him those questions again ... just don't expect any sort of answer.

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  84. Meatros,

    This sentence is false.

    >>Is the sentence above true or false? By the law of bivalence, it has to be one or the other. So please answer and justify your answer.

    I thought you would mention Titus 1:12 at this point, but you didn't. The discussion that old though.

    "Act naturally, Butt head!" Are all oxymorons, as literary expressions, illogical?

    As the Bible claims (Romans 3:4) that 'every man is a liar' is still a true statement. Sometimes truthful, does not mean always truthful.

    >>So how do we get on the correct path without reason?

    Its not that reason is not used, it is. Again, I am not saying that atheists do not reason, all I am saying is that they have no basis for assuming that their reasoning is valid, yet they make that assumption.

    >>How do you know what is God's revelation?

    God reveals it. It would take intellectual dishonesty to claim that God could not reveal some things to us such that we could know them for certain.

    >>Remember you are supposed to be accounting for your worldview, not simply repeating a claim.

    As a Christian just said, All non-Christian worldviews fall on their own merits using the same type of critical assessment.

    You are more likely to see the reduction of the naturalistic worldview to absurdity because it goes down with less discussion. The debate ends at the point where the naturalist/atheist cannot adequately account for their own thought process and rationality - within their own worldview.

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  85. Dan +†+ said...

    In response to Meatros' question "How do you know what is God's revelation?"

    God reveals it.

    ROFLCOPTER. This is brilliant, Dan knows it's God's revelation because God revealed it's God's revelation. The most viciously circular argument you're ever likely to see.

    It would take intellectual dishonesty to claim that God could not reveal some things to us such that we could know them for certain.

    No-one has claimed that He (if He existed) could not. Instead I have pointed out that, on your own claims - absolute certainty requires omniscience - God would need to grant you omniscience in order for you to be certain about the source and veracity of the revelation you claim to have received. By your own admission, you are not omniscient, therefore you cannot claim to be certain.

    Your only response to this is to repeat your claim once more as if that somehow proves your claim.

    The hypocrisy of you calling anyone else's worldview absurd whilst you sit atop a mountain of absurdities that form the foundations of your own worldview is simply mind-boggling.

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  86. Dan Wrote: I thought you would mention Titus 1:12 at this point, but you didn't. The discussion that old though.


    This doesn't answer the question - it's just a similar sentence.

    This sentence is false.

    Is the sentence above true or false? According to you, it has to be one or the other.

    Dan Wrote: "Act naturally, Butt head!" Are all oxymorons, as literary expressions, illogical?

    As the Bible claims (Romans 3:4) that 'every man is a liar' is still a true statement. Sometimes truthful, does not mean always truthful.


    In classical logic, it is a contradiction. So unless you are saying that the laws of logic are incorrect - by appealing to the bible (as you seem to be doing here) - then you have to give an account.

    Now, since you seem to be saying that the law of bivalence is wrong, once again, why are you asking for atheists to provide an account of something you do not hold to be fundamental?

    So, atheists - according to your reasoning - no longer have to provide an account for either the laws of logic or the uniformity of nature. This is because you do not hold the laws of logic to be absolute (as witnessed above), nor do you hold nature to be uniform (as witnessed in our past conversations).

    Dan Wrote: Its not that reason is not used, it is.

    At this point i have to ask if you understand your own argument.

    Dan Wrote: Again, I am not saying that atheists do not reason, all I am saying is that they have no basis for assuming that their reasoning is valid, yet they make that assumption.


    I am fully aware of what presuppositionalists claim. I am pointing out that you have no basis for assuming that your reasoning is valid. I thought I've made that clear.

    Dan Wrote: God reveals it. It would take intellectual dishonesty to claim that God could not reveal some things to us such that we could know them for certain.

    This is what is called an assertion. You need to provide a basis for why you believe something is part of god's revelation.

    Seriously, I've (and others) repeated this point. Do you not understand what we are asking?

    Dan Wrote: As a Christian just said, All non-Christian worldviews fall on their own merits using the same type of critical assessment.


    Technically this is irrelevant to whether or not your worldview falls on the same sword. I have shown that it does.

    I could claim that nature just reveals itself to us and that it would take intellectual dishonesty to claim that nature could not reveal some things to us such that we could know them for certain.

    Get it now?

    Dan Wrote: You are more likely to see the reduction of the naturalistic worldview to absurdity because it goes down with less discussion.

    "More likely"? Is this a concession of what the atheists here already know - simply that your worldview has been reduced to absurdity?

    Dan Wrote: The debate ends at the point where the naturalist/atheist cannot adequately account for their own thought process and rationality - within their own worldview.

    I see, so the fact that your worldview cannot adequately account for your own thought processes and rationality is simply not up for discussion?

    And you were talking about intellectual dishonesty earlier? This is insulting.

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  87. freddies_dead Wrote: ROFLCOPTER. This is brilliant, Dan knows it's God's revelation because God revealed it's God's revelation. The most viciously circular argument you're ever likely to see.

    I honestly do not think that Dan understands the argument he's parroting. He's insulting us by pretending to understand it and then claiming that atheism has been debunked.

    I thought he simply wasn't willing to address the apparent problem with his worldview, but it seems much more likely that he doesn't understand what he's actually arguing.

    His arguments have made it clear that he doesn't accept the laws of logic nor the uniformity of nature - yet he's still demanding atheists account for these things? This tells me that he doesn't really get what he's talking about.

    His dismissal of logical systems as 'atheist logic' is absurd and it would be laughable except I think he actually believes it.

    freddies_dead Wrote: No-one has claimed that He (if He existed) could not. Instead I have pointed out that, on your own claims - absolute certainty requires omniscience - God would need to grant you omniscience in order for you to be certain about the source and veracity of the revelation you claim to have received. By your own admission, you are not omniscient, therefore you cannot claim to be certain.

    Spot on criticism and it should be easily understood. It's much better stated then what I've been writing.

    freddies_dead Wrote: The hypocrisy of you calling anyone else's worldview absurd whilst you sit atop a mountain of absurdities that form the foundations of your own worldview is simply mind-boggling.

    Yet instead of taking a moment, or admitting that he might be wrong, he persists in his dogmatic assertions that atheism is absurd. He even has the gall to say that atheists are arrogant.

    My head is spinning.

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  88. Someone asking Dan: How do you know what is God's revelation?

    God reveals it. It would take intellectual dishonesty to claim that God could not reveal some things to us such that we could know them for certain.
    I call bullshit, Dan. That's not even an answer. If it's been "revealed" to you, then DESCRIBE IT! How effing difficult could it be, if it actually happened?

    As far as any of us have known you, you did not spout this crap until after you met SyeTenB.

    You have yet to show that you recieved this "revelation". As I said before, just because a thing is possible, does not mean that it actually happened.

    And no, I'm not referring to the bible. I'm referrring to that other "revelation" that you claim to have had.

    Why in hell have none of US had this "revelation"?

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  89. Reynold,

    >>...you did not spout this crap until after you met SyeTenB.

    That is not true or fair. I was a presuppositionalist before knowing I was. Sye, Bahnsen, et al., helped me refine my thoughts, sure. But you can see hints of it in my posts. I believe that is why I latched on to it so strongly in this past year or so, truth is a bright light in the room. I just KNEW I was on to something. That and I am trying, operative word is try, to read more about it recently.

    For kicks I did a search to see when I actually started to understand and use it. The first thing I have said using presuppositionalism as an argument was when I quoted Matt on the Friendly Atheist blog on 8/23/2007. I quoted: "Is your presupposition that my ignorance invalidates any of my arguments? I could presuppose that your ignorance of God negates your ability to rightly judge his existence, thereby forcing you to arrive at erring conclusions about evolution."

    So the real culprit here, if that is what you want to call it, would be Matt @ CARM. I also remember pointing to Sye's website every time someone was seeking "Proof" of God, even back then. It was all uphill from there. :7) Although I did not quite grasp it entirely back then but you know me, I will point people to the direction that is better equipped to address the issue, because I know my own limitations. I will admit that Sye was the turbo charger for the subject though. I cannot look back after all of this.

    >>And no, I'm not referring to the bible. I'm referrring to that other "revelation" that you claim to have had.

    I cannot explain every revelation in my life, a past post tried to list some of the examples, but two that are examinable are the Bible and the nature around us. How do I know this? God revealed it. God revealed that He can be trusted. God revealed this as His work.

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  90. Reynold cont'd,

    >>Why in hell have none of US had this "revelation"?

    Oh but you have. You just deny God, His Word, and His revelations. You ignore the signs. No surprise there. Are you seeking God as instructed in His Word. Are you placing Him, in faith, as first in your life as He requires? If not, its no wonder that any personal revelations are squelched. I have hundreds of personal stories that points to God.

    I will appease you with one. It was two years after reading the Bible for the very first time in my life. I believe I was 25 or so. A cranky older woman had a flat tire one Sunday morning and pulled up to where I was working. She barked for me to call a tow truck because she had a flat. She was very short. I said I would change it for her if she had the spare. So, in record time I might add, I changed it. She tried to hand me money. I refused. She forcefully insisted. She was getting angry even. I stopped her and said "If I take your money then I changed that tire for a different reason then I did it for" She stopped in shock, started to cry. She said in her 80 years that has never happened to her. She placed both her old cold hands on my face and said something like "you gave me faith again" whatever that meant. She thanked me and left still crying many tears. It was moving. Is it a mere coincidence that an elderly jaded hardened lady had a flat tire at my place to have some semblance of hope in humanity restored? But the real kicker to what happened is I saw God for what He is. Love. It moved me more then it moved that lady i believe. I am still in awe as to witness that lady's metamorphose. I still cannot stop thinking of that then cranky woman. I am grateful for that day. I am certain that she will be there to greet me when I pass. How do I know? God is revealing it to me as I am writing this. He is placing unquestionable assurance in my soul and instincts. How is he doing that? I have no clue.

    I am sure you have an atheistic naturalistic counter as to what may have happened, but it will be a pointless exercise to convince me otherwise. It would be like trying to convince me that I am a lion trapped in a man's body, or something else just as absurd.

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  91. I will just make this a new post. I am sure that people will have something to say about it.

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  92. A new post. Perhaps you will explain on what basis you can tell if something is a genuine revelation or not.

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  93. Something juicy for you Dan+++

    http://www.atheistpropaganda.com/2011/03/finally-proof-that-gods-exist-maybe.html

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  94. Ok, I'll post my reply in your new post.

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  95. There isn't a single peer-reviewed scientific paper with adequate references which backs up
    "premise 1".

    The EAAN is stillborn and really stupid.

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  96. Nightvid,

    >>There isn't a single peer-reviewed scientific paper with adequate references which backs up
    "premise 1".

    Do you take the peer reviewed papers as your ultimate authority? If so I hate to break this news to you but, "The peer review system does not always detect fraud, plagiarism, poor quality or gross error and there is editorial reluctance to correct errors or to publish criticisms of sacred cows or 'controversial' or nonconformist views of skeptics and dissident minorities." (http://bit.ly/3gUcsN)"

    So it may be fallacious to appeal to peer reviews as truth.

    >>The EAAN is stillborn and really stupid.

    That must mean its false then, right? Wow you are chalk full of fallaciousness today.

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  97. The peer review system may not be perfect, but it's the best we've got...better than what you creationists and religionists have, which is nothing. At least peer review involves people in the relevant fields of research going over the work of other people in that field. In that case, it's not fallacious.

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  98. Reynold,

    If "fraud, plagiarism, poor quality or gross error and there is editorial reluctance to correct errors or to publish criticisms of sacred cows or 'controversial' or nonconformist views of skeptics and dissident minorities" is your sense of "best we've got" then you have no sense of what that is.

    You don't think highly of mankind, for being a humanist that is.

    "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." ~Edmund Burke

    The "best we've got" for evil to reign is the peer review system. Science gave evil a tool to reign with indeed. If that is what you meant then we agree on something. Hide and "justify" failure if you wish, but I believe we are better then that though. Well, some of us anyway.

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  99. So the point flies right over Dan's head again...if you want "poor quality", "gross error", and "editoral reluctance to correct errors or to publish criticisms of sacred cows" especially that last one???

    That's creationist "peer review" you've described. Those people take oaths before they're even allowed to join and do research in the first place. You're not allowed to publish anything that goes against what they've already agreed on as the conclusions.

    You fool...religion is what gives the motive for evil. Science is neutral; it gives tools for those to use for good, or ill.

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  100. Reynold,

    Have you ever seen the documentaries Fat Head and Generation RX? They, and many others, reveal the true master of secular scientists,...money!

    If you believe money does NOT skew the results, or findings, to please the provider of the funding, then you are in denial on a whole other level...which is the M.O. of the Atheist.

    Speaking of fool...

    In scriptural perspective the fool is not basically a shallow-minded or illiterate ignoramus; he can be quite educated and sophisticated in social reckoning. However, he is a fool because he has forsaken the source of true wisdom in God in order to rely on his own (allegedly), self-sufficient, intellectual powers. He is unteachable (Prov. 10:8) and despises instruction (Prov. 15:5); whereas the wise man heeds counsel given to him, “The way of a fool is right in his own eyes” (Prov. 12:15). The fool has utter self-confidence and imagines himself to be intellectually autonomous. “He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool” (Prov. 28:26). A fool cannot think of himself as mistaken (Prov. 17:10). He judges matters according to his own pre-established standards of truth and right, and thus his own thoughts always turn out in the long run to be correct. The fool is sure that he can rely on his own rational authority and intellectual scrutiny. “The fool beareth himself insolently and is confident” (Prov. 14:16), and therefore he utters his own mind (Prov. 29:11).

    In actuality, this autonomous man is dull, stubborn, boorish, obstinate and stupid. He professes himself to be wise, but from the opening of his mouth it is clear that he is (in the biblical sense) “a fool”—his only wisdom would consist in keeping silent (Prov. 17:28).

    “The heart of fools proclaimeth foolishness” (Prov. 12:23), and the fool flaunts his folly (Prov. 13:16). He eats up folly unreflectingly (Prov. 15:14), pours it out (Prov. 15:2), and returns to it like a dog to his vomit (Prov. 26:11). He is so in love with his folly and so dedicated to its preservation that “It is better for a man to meet a bear robbed of her whelps, than a fool in his folly” (Prov. 17:12). The fool does not really want to find the truth; he only wants to be self-justified in his own imaginations. While he may feign objectivity, “A fool hath no delight in understanding, but only that his heart may reveal itself” (Prov. 18:2). He is committed to his own presuppositions and wishes to guard his autonomy. Thus he will not depart from evil (Prov. 13:19), and thus all his knowledgeable talk reveals nothing but perverse and lying lips (Prov. 10:18; 19:1). He may talk proudly, but “A fool’s mouth is his destruction, and his lips are the snare of his soul” (Prov. 18:7). He shall not endure the judgment of God (Ps. 5:5). How does a man become such a self-deluded, allegedly autonomous, fool? A fool despises wisdom and instruction, refusing to begin his thinking with reverence toward the Lord (Prov. 1:7). He rejects God’s commandments (Prov. 10:8) and even dares to reproach the Almighty (Ps. 74:22; Job 1:22). “The thought of foolishness is sin” (Prov. 24:9). The fool will not be governed by God’s word; he is lawless, just as his thinking is lawless (i.e., sinful, 1 John. 3:4). ~Bahnsen, Greg; Booth, Robert (2011-03-03). Always Ready: Directions for Defending the Faith

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  101. >>However, he is a fool because he has forsaken the source of true wisdom in God in order to rely on his own (allegedly), self-sufficient, intellectual powers.

    In common parlance, you are saying that anyone who doesn't believe in magic and ancient mythology is a fool because they choose to use the tools of reason.

    In reality, a fool is someone who lacks sound judgment - I.E. one who abandons reason for flights of personal fancy like gods and devils and magic.

    Quoting your book of fairy tales just makes you look silly.

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  102. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  103. Dan, if money was the true goal of secular science, then pretty much all of those who are scientists now would be just working for private industries instead of plain research or working at universities.

    Something else: How much money does any so-called "secular humanist" lobby give to biological scientists to say, keep up the theory of evolution?

    Or to physicists of various fields and to geologists to keep up the old age of the earth and the universe?

    You've built up a huge conspiracy theory Dan, with no evidence.

    On the religious side, however, your creationist "scientists" all have to swear to abide by the pre-arrived at conclusions of their respective organizations (as seen in their statements of faith) like AIG, CMI, ICR, etc before they're allowed to do research.

    By definition, no apparent, perceived or claimed evidence in any field, including history and chronology, can be valid if it contradicts the Scriptural record. Of primary importance is the fact that evidence is always subject to interpretation by fallible people who do not possess all information.
    Yet that lack of information doesn't stop them from just assuming that the bible is right, first and always, does it?

    Then there's their beliefs about the flood, etc.



    Which do you think would "skew" the results more? This so-far unproved funding the "humanists" give scientists or the above oath of faith required of every creationist? How many universities or scientific research institutions require such statements?

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  104. The funny thing is, 10 days prior to this post, Feng Ye published a (in my opinion) brilliant response to this argument in a paper titled "Naturalized Truth and Plantinga's Argument Against Naturalism", in which he explains that the claim that "P(R/N&E) is low or inscrutable" is based on a question-begging assumption about the notion of the content represented by a neuro-physiological state in a brain. This is to say, the argument being invoked here is essentially as circular agument, and that won't fly.
    I maintain that it is entirely reasonable to hold the position that atheism is fully rational.

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  105. Never said it wasn’t circular, just that it is not viciously circular, as your view is. Intellectual honesty would force you to admit that God could reveal some things to us such that we can know them for certain. You, on the other hand, have no avenue to certainty.

    Greg Bahnsen writes: ”In the Christian worldview, however, the Christian is not engaged in viciously circular argument, a circular argument on the same plane. We appeal above and beyond the temporal realm. God’s self-revelation in nature and in Scripture informs us of the two-level universe. God is not a fact like other facts in the world. He is the Creator and Establisher of all else. His existence alone makes the universe, and reason, and human experience possible… … The “circularity” of a transcendental argument is not at all the same as the fallacious ‘circularity’ of an argument in which the conclusion is a restatement (in one form or another) of one of its premises.” ~ (Pushing the Antithesis pg.) 124.

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  106. [If S believes N&E then S has a defeater for R.]
    False.

    We evolved reliable sense-detectors like eyeballs and skin cells.

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