Archive

Archive for the ‘Apologetics’ Category

John Haught On The New Atheists.

January 24, 2012 Leave a comment

Read any apologetics piece and you’re likely to get several claims: atheists adhere to a strict scientism, atheism is nihilistic, atheism leads to relativism, atheists can be moral, but have no basis for that morality (See Zacharias, The Real Face of Atheism, Craig, On Guard, Moreland, The God Question etc for examples).

Haught doesn’t let the team down in his critique of the New Athiests (here after “NA”).  It takes Haught all of one page into his book to charge the NA (when he says NA he primarily means Dawkins, Hitchens and Harris, he considers his book to be a refutation of all other NA, by extension, p. IX) with scientism (he gives a much more comprehensive definition on p. XIII- XIV):

The belief system that Dennett and the other new atheists subscribe to is known as “scientific naturalism” ["scientism"]. Its central dogma is that only nature, including humans and our creations, is real: that God does not exist; and that science alone can give us complete and reliable knowledge of reality. (Haught, God and the New Atheism, p. X, 2008)

Of course, a real scholar would provide lengthy references for us to look up the dogmatic language used by the NA. But, of course, not a single source, or note is provided. Much is the way this entire book goes. Which is ironic given how much Haught goes on about what a high theologian he is, and how far above the NA his writing is. One wonders (for a referenced source of what the NA actually have to say on this issue, please see here).

Haught continues on his scientism strawman argument for about 20 pages until we come to what he perceives are the fundamental issues and consequences of atheism:

Go all the way and think the business of atheism through to the bitter end; before you get too comfortable with the godless world you long for, you will be required by the logic of any consistent skepticism to pass through the disorienting wilderness of nihilism. Do you have the courage for that? (Haught, God and the New Atheism, p. 22, 2008)

But it doesn’t end for Haught there, he continues stating that in the absence of a God you are the creator of the values you live by (relativism), but this is obviously a burden, according to Haught, that one would surely want to escape. That escape is the Nietzschean “Madman’s sensation of straying through”infinite nothingness.” (p. 22) It does, according to Haught, require an “unprecedented courage” to wipe away the transcendent world of a God, in the end Haught asks if we are willing to risk madness, and if not, you are not really an atheist. (p. 22)

As always, this type of rhetoric is clear projection: the world would seem this bleak to Haught, it seems his God is a crutch that gets him through the night. And though I’m reluctant to label him with so shallow a belief, it seems obvious that’s how he feels, when we see a world without God, through his eyes. If he was so well read, he would see many positive, atheist books extolling the virtues of a naturalized philosophy (see  Carrier’s Sense and Goodness Without God, Murray’s The Atheist’s Primer, Kai Nielsen’s Atheism and Philosophy, John Shook’s The God Debates,  not to mention the NA literature itself etc for examples)? Instead Haught wishes to focus on the writings of 3 existentialist, nihilistic philosophers (Sartre, Nietzsche and Camus) as the basis for how atheism should really be?

This is obviously nonsensical – leaving aside that atheism isn’t a movement, a worldview, a belief system, a religion, a dogma etc, no matter how hard Haught works, or wishes it to be so – you can be an atheist and a nihilist, you can be an atheist and a humanist, you can be an atheist and a moral relativist, you can be an atheist and believe in objective morals, or even, absolute morals. There is no contradiction in these, and atheism; these are all intellectual additions to a foundational atheism, worldviews which (can) include atheism.

In Haught’s discussion of morality I feel like he wants to give some kind of divine command theory as his justification for morals, but he never really delves deep enough into the issue to make any grand declarations of such, even though he eludes to it:

[On the NA] But where logical rigor would require that they also acknowledge that there is no timeless heaven to determine (emphasis mine) what is good and what is not… (Haught, God and the New Atheism, p. 24-5, 2008)

And again, on the next page he states that if there is no eternal grounding for values, then all we are left with is “arbitrary, conventional, historically limited, human concoctions”.  (p. 26)  Moreover he charges the NA with holding this supposed moral relativism as “absolutely binding” (p. 26). He states the NA demonstrate an absoluteness in their values of intolerance toward faith, and that to make moral proclamations you must assume that there exists a “mode of being, a realm of rightness that does not owe itself completely to human intervention, Darwinian selection, or social construction.” (p. 26) To Haught, if absolute morals exist, God exists, similarly the reverse is also true, if God does not exist, absolute morals do not and “one should not issue moral judgements as if they do.” (p. 26)

This is all very nice rhetoric, but I hope it is obvious to the reader, that Haught has offered no justification to substantiate his series of claims – no references, no formal argument of any kind, logical or evidential. His book reads like a sermon. But do we need to listen to a word of it? He does not cite where the NA make such proclamations (he quotes them without citation), and assuming they made such proclamations, Haught is merely assuming that without God, there can be no talk of morals. Why must this be so? Can reason, and evidence not suggest to us what normative moral choices we must make? And would this not be exactly what we would expect to see in a naturalized philosophy? A discussion of morals that deals with the world, as it is? What better way to make moral exhortations, than by looking at the evidence, and dealing rationally with the consequences, through philosophy, and evidence. How poor and low must we be, to rely on Bronze Age tomes to pronounce how to act, and what to think? Haught’s version of morals amounts to divine command – what God says goes – too bad for homosexuals, women, atheists etc, I guess.

Haught does not agree that reason is enough to get us to a place of moral prescription, as it is based on our reasoning, which is fallible (p. 73):

… as Harris conjectures, we can fall back on reason alone to explain what our obligations are and why we should heed them. Yet, even apart from the historical naiveté of such a proposal, this rationale simply leads us back to a more fundamental question: why should we trust our reasoning abilities either? If the human mind evolved by Darwinian selection in the same way as every other trait we possess, we still have to be able to justify our trust in its cognitional capacity – its ability to put us in touch with truth – in some way other than biology alone. (Haught, God and the New Atheism, p. 73-4, 2008)

Haught continues stating that a naturalistic worldview cannot justify the above presupposition.  (p. 74) But this view seems to assume that each individual is disconnected from a recorded history, from other minds, from scientific evidence, from logical argument, from societal changes and pressures. Haught may be right, that if I were a lone person, stranded on an island I might have no way to confirm my moral choices (what moral choices I could make in that situation of course). But has Haught represented, accurately, the situation we find ourselves in? I would think not. We have all of those avenues mentioned above, to self correct the misgivings and short comings we have in our cognitive faculties.

There is also another assumption present in Haught’s view – that we (a) must be, or (b) can be absolutely right about all moral choices all the time. But, again, why think this is so? We are fallible creatures, our historical context, in both religious and secular settings, demonstrates that we have had ebbs and flows of moral development, which seems to suggest we are still heading toward a better moral perspective.

Conclusion

I don’t think Haught has made his case for the same old tired apologetics used against atheism. No source is given to demonstrate the NA’s views on scientism, only Haught’s (constant) assertion that they subscribe to that view. I hope I’ve demonstrated (via the link provided) that not only is this a baseless assertion, it is demonstrably false. If I have succeeded in demonstrating that point, we see much of Haught’s book is a strawman attempt, I leave it for you to decide what you make of such an author who relies on such tactics.

Similarly Haught never shows us why a nihilistic view of atheism would be bad, even we agree it might be, but the fact that he’s citing philosophers who are such, suggests that such a view can be rationally justified. What Haught relies on is an emotional response – we view nihilism as negative, as relative, as amoral, so we would not want to be like that – hence atheism is bad.

Similarly with his charge of relativism and atheism having no basis for morals. It should be obvious to any reader of this blog by now, what atheism is: a lack of belief in a god or gods. Under this definition atheism has no responsibility to find a moral system, that is the job of a naturalized philosophy, or a materialistic philosophy, or a feminist philosophy etc. Adding to that, I think it can be demonstrated, at least as superficially as I have done in this post, that a naturalized philosophy provides a more coherent moral basis, one that is suited to the world, than the one based on the dictator in the sky.

Reference

Haught, J.F., (2008). God and the New Atheism. Louisville, Kentucky. Westminster John Knox Press. Pp. IX, X,  XIII, XIV, 22, 24-5, 73-4, 75.

Related articles
Categories: Apologetics, Book Review, Ethics, Theism

Loftier Musings on The Kalam Cosmological Argument.

November 15, 2011 Leave a comment

Today I want to do something of a prima facie investigation into some of the problems I have with the cosmological argument. So much of the debate on the Kalam get’s caught up in the arguments premises, as well it should, but in this post I want to explore only a few issues, some contradictions, fallacies and whether God as an answer, is really an answer at all. Of course some of these objections and queries may not seem new to some of you, and some may seem new, but please, bear with me anyway.

For those who don’t know it, here is the argument, famously propagated by William Lane Craig:

  1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
  2. The universe began to exist.
  3. Therefore, the universe had a cause. (Craig, On Guard, p. 74, 2010)

There has been much ink spilled on this argument, for rebuttals see most atheist literature from Loftus to Martin. There has also been much debate too; see here, here, here for examples.

Today though, instead of going through and showing why each premise fails, I want to move on to some other issues. You may ask, why not address the argument directly? Well, for lack of a better excuse, it’s boring! That may seem arbitrary and lame, but what I really mean is: far better people than me have addressed this argument, I’m not so foolish as to think I could add to their work, I want to do something of a mental exercise for myself, to see what I might contribute to this great discussion.

I could go through the standard objections: that, as is, the Kalam doesn’t lead to anything supernatural, and even if it did (based on objectionable, hidden premises) that supposed supernatural answer doesn’t lead to a god, to suggest so, could be construed as an argument from ignorance (the universe has a cause X, we don’t know what X is, ipso facto: God)  rather it leads to an unknown. To get to anyone’s specific god you need additional arguments, what those arguments are, I don’t know.  The moral or fine-tuning arguments as Craig uses? Why cant the Muslim use those? And if they can, they don’t help the Christian – the evidence for a theory we might consider (i.e – a god exists) should not be able to prove multiple, contradictory hypothesis. The Resurrection argument as Craig uses? Sure, but does that argument prove the Christian God? Or merely beg the question by assuming the Christian God, to prove a miracle (for more on this see here and here)? Moreover how does the Kalam relate to, or follow from the Resurrection argument? They seem disparate.

We could object to the first premise  saying that (virtual) particles do pop into existence out of nothing, with no cause. True, they don’t exist in a vacuum but do we understand the universe to have come into existence via vacuum? It is a vacuum, not in one.

We could sprout the composition fallacy, that because parts of the whole act a certain way (i.e the universe contains cause and effect), it does not follow that the whole does (i.e that the universe is similarly caused). Think of a flock of sheep – each sheep has a mother, it does not follow that the herd does too.

We could go on, and on of course, but rather I want to look at 3 conjoined issues: infinity, sequential causation, and why god is no explanation – as it is a mystery.

Infinity and sequential causation.

It always strikes me as odd that some theists, when trying to defend the second premise of the Kalam attempt to demonstrate that the universe can’t be necessarily existent in eternity. They try to show, alongside the empirical evidence for the big bang that there is good philosophical evidence to accept a finite beginning for the universe, they do this by making an argument against it existing in infinity. Of course, the first thing that comes to mind is: this is special pleading. We are left to ask, if the universe couldn’t exist for infinity, just how exactly does your god? Why cant the universe have the same creative powers as a creator God? Peter Kreeft and Ronald Tacelli, in their book Handbook of Catholic Apologetics defend the Kalam in just such as way:

Now, if the universe never began, then it always was. If it always was then it is infinitely old. If it is infinitely old, then an infinite amount of time would have elapsed before (say) today. And so an infinite number of days must have been completed – one day succeeding another, one bit of time added to what went before – in order for the present day to arrive. (Kreeft and Tacelli, Handbook of Catholic Apologetics, p. 9, 2009)

Could we not pose this exact problem to Kreeft and Tacelli?

Now, if the universe god never began, then it always was. If it always was then it is infinitely old. If it is infinitely old, then an infinite amount of time would have elapsed before (say) today. And so an infinite number of days must have been completed – one day succeeding another, one bit of time added to what went before – in order for the present day to arrive.

The Christian God is generally defined as amongst other things,  infinite – to define a being this way, and then construct an argument that demonstrates nature could not have the exact same feature, seems like a tricky word game, and clear special pleading to me. What is it about God, that is different to the universe? For this we turn to John Loftus in his book, Why I Became an Atheist, who quotes Wes Morriston:

If someone insists it is just ‘obvious’ that God could create a world without any pre-existing material stuff to work with, on the ground there is no logical contradiction in the idea of such a feat, then the proper reply is that there is also no logical contradiction in the idea of the universe beginning without a cause. (Loftus, Why I Became an Atheist, p. 85, 2008)

Moreover, as John Allen Paulos states in his book Irreligion: Occam’s razor actually begs that we shave off unnecessary assumptions which would make taking the universe itself as an uncaused cause the greatest virtue – to use Paulos’ expression. (Paulos, Irreligion, p. 108, 2008)

The point, I hope, is clear – what is good for God, be it infinity or creation, should also be good for the universe – if it’s not, it is special pleading.

We don’t know what their response would be, as they don’t address this objection. Let us go through what their possible objections might have been.

They could argue that God didn’t exist in time, that god invented the temporal realm when it created the universe, but this leads to absurdities. The Dictionaryof Science defines time as:

A dimension that enables two otherwise identical events that occur at the same point in space be distinguished. The interval between two such events forms the basis of time measurement. (Daintith, Martin Ed’s, The Dictionary of Science, p.  822, 2010)

The above definition seems to demonstrate that causes and effects are done within time, with this in mind, we could ask (a) how they know God exists, thinks and acts outside of time, it does no good to simply assert a being does X as an ad hoc hypothesis, you need to demonstrate that it does and (b) it is not at all clear, or perhaps even logical that the Christian God was able to exact causation, think etc outside of time. How it could exist in not-time, think in not-time, as all these attributes are temporally dependent.

Again we refer to John Allen Paulos and his book Irreligion:

… efforts made by some to put God, the putative first cause, completely outside of time and space give up entirely the notion of cause, which is defined in terms of time. After all, A causes B, only if A comes before B, and the first cause comes – surprise – first, before its consequences. In fact, ordinary language breaks down when we contemplate these matters. (Paulos, Irreligion, p. 5-6, 2008)

Let us run a little thought experiment based on the above definition of time: to think thought (a) you need time (a), to think thought (b), you also need time (b) – to think thought (a) and (b) at time (a) violates the law of identity and results in a contradiction. Thought of act, thought of ponderance, all require an interval from time (a) to time (b), without that temporal delineation God would have every thought, every experience it has ever had at time (a) which would result in it holding the belief of a and ~a at the same time, hence the aforementioned contradiction. But even this understanding makes no sense, as there would have been no time (a) hence God would have to think, and act without time – but this makes no sense, and leads us back to asking just exactly how the authors know their God has done so – until they offer us some ways to understand the logical quagmire we’re in, we are justified in rejecting this concept.

God as an explanation.

These absurdities lead us to our third objection: that God is so much of a mystery, that to pose it as an answer to anything, acts as no explanation. Traditional theology has simply defined god as that which needs no explanation, so putting god into an unknown like the pre-big bang makes prima facie sense, and I can see why a theist sees this as a resolution to the problem. The critic takes issue with this however, we want good explanations for events, not ad hoc hypothesis.

The theist could argue the difference between contingent and necessary beings – the universe is probably a thing that had a beginning, hence it could not have been, this makes it and everything contained within it, contingent. Necessary beings cannot not exist, they have no origin and cannot be destructed – we cannot rationally conceive of its nonexistence and it needs no explanation of its existence. The universe is contingent and god is necessary – hence the universe requires an explanation (God) and God requires no explanation. The issue here is, why could the universe, taken as a whole,  not also be an uncaused, necessary being? And, why should God be postulated as a necessary being? Moreover, even if God itself requires no explanation, it fails as an explanation.

Shook states in his book The God Debates that:

… explanations do not get automatically sanctioned by reason, not even if there is no other explanation that we can think of right now. Theology Beyond The World’s proposed arguments for a god explaining the universe can’t pass the test of reason. Furthermore a good explanation had better include some extra details sufficient to deal with obvious concerns. For example, if god created the universe, why did god do this? What is it about god that would cause god to create this sort of universe, and not some other type? Are there any other gods playing with their own universes? Why can there be only one god? Does god create many universes, or just one? Did god have to create this universe’s natural laws? Couldn’t god have done a better job? How can we know tat we are the whole point of this universe? What or who else might have this universe been designed for? What is god going to do with this universe? If god really exists, then what explains god? What or who created god? If god didn’t have an explanation, doesn’t that violate the principle of sufficient reason? (Shook, The God Debates, p. 153-4, 2010)

I think the point Shook is making is that the God “explanation” really offers us nothing – it has no predictive power, in that the God hypothesis does nothing to predict events, causes or clues to gain us further knowledge about ourselves and the universe. It is a place holder – until we find the seemingly inevitable natural answer. It simply raises more questions than it answers. This is something George H. Smith asks in his book Atheism: The Case Against God:

To posit god as the cause of the universe still leaves two crucial questions unanswered: What caused the universe? How did it cause the universe? To say a god is responsible for the existence of the universe is vacuous without knowledge of god’s nature and the method used in creating the existence. If god is to serve as a causal explanation, we must have knowledge of god’s attributes by virtue of which has the capacity to create from nonexistence, and knowledge of the causal process involved in creation, by virtue of which god designated as a cause. (Smith, Atheism: The Case Against God, p. 238, 1989)

As Smith states, the theists answer amounts to: “An unknowable being using, unknowable methods “caused” the universe to snap into existence.” (Smith, Atheism: The Case Against God, p. 238, 1989) This relates back to our first 2 issues of causation and infinity, it simply makes no sense to posit a creator as an answer to creation, especially when the explanations it offers are :”somehow”, or “through incomprehensible means”, these are not explanations – they are mysteries.

Conclusion

Why would we prefer a supernatural explanation in this instance, when it leads to contradictions, absurdities, a failure of Occam’s razor and offers us no explanatory power? Is it those amongst us who have a need for certainty that need an inviolable answer like a god to plug up our gaps in knowledge? Speaking as an atheist, I have no problem simply saying: “I don’t know” to the question of what happened pre- big bang, because, a posteriori proofs aside,  ultimately we don’t know. As a methodological naturalist, I’m ok with tentatively accepting the theories and hypothesis science has to offer – how much weight we put in those is relative to the evidence, and I admit, the evidence is not strong – but so what? My worldview does not require I have all the answers with absolute certainty, particularly when those answers go beyond what we know. We may never know in our lifetimes what the “cause” of the universe is, or even if it makes sense to talk in terms of causation and time pre- big bang. Does that mean I can’t love my family, my friends, my girlfriend and my life? Of course not.

References

Craig W.L. (2010) On Guard. Lee Vance View, Colorado Springs. David C. Cook. P. 74.

(2010). The Dictionary of Science (Daintith J., Martin E. Ed’s). New York, New York.  Oxford University Press. P. 822.

Kreeft P. J., Tacelli R.K. (2009). Handbook of Catholic Apologetics. San Francisco. Ignatius Press. P. 64.

Loftus J. W. (2008). Why I Became an Atheist. Amherst, New York. Prometheus Books. P. 85.

Paulos J. A. (2008). Irreligion. New York, New York. Douglas & McIntyre Inc. P. 5-6.

Shook J.R.  (2010). The God Debates. Sussex, United Kingdom. Wiley-Blackwell. P. 136, 153-4.

Smith G.H. (1989). Atheism: The Case Against God (second edition). Amherst, New York. Prometheus Books. P. 238.

Related articles
Categories: Apologetics, Atheism, Skepticism, Theism

Loftier Musings On Kreeft’s Handbook of Catholic Apologetics.

October 19, 2011 Leave a comment

Our compelling reasons to write this book are three:

  1. We are certain the Christian faith is true.
  2. We are only a  little less certain that the very best thing we can possibly do for others is to persuade them of this truth, in which there is joy and peace and love incomparable in this world, and infinite incomprehensible in the next.
  3. We are a little less certain, but still confident, that honest reasoning can lead any open-minded person to this very same conclusion. (Kreeft and Tacelli, Handbook of Catholic Apologetics, p. 9, 2009)

A whole book could be written on this bizarre opening statement.

When the authors say: “We are certain the Christian faith is true” and “We are a little less certain, but still confident, that honest reasoning can lead any open-minded person to this very same conclusion.” – they seem to be engaging in some fallacious reasoning.

After all – they are certain Christianity is true, yet less certain that honest reasoning can lead you there? What are the authors privy to, that you or I might not be? One might say that the authors are suggesting it is the reader who brings their own presuppositions to the table that makes for the uncertainty – that the evidence is enough to make the authors certain, but you may make faulty conclusions. Aside from this being a nice little switching of the burden of proof fallacy, the authors bypass the above statement by claiming that “honest reasoning can lead any open-minded person to this very same conclusion”  – which means in cases of honest individuals reasoning, the same conclusions made by the authors should be met – after all if the evidence is there and we are looking at it honestly – why wouldn’t we come to the conclusion Christianity is true? Could it be that the evidence isn’t there – and Christians have made an epistemic leap to unjustified conclusions? Not according to these authors – it is because you are being dishonest, close minded and unreasonable – unfortunately ad hominem is a fallacy that does not solve arguments.

Moreover we see a nice little apologetic tactic in there too – something to help nuzzle believers into a comfort zone of unthreatening acceptance – “honest reasoning can lead any open-minded person to this very same conclusion.” – therefore any who don’t accept their conclusions are dis-honest, close-minded and un-reasonable? Unfortunately an unbeliever is immediately put on the back foot by these kind of statements, and is left to wonder, without answer, just why they are so unreasonable, close-minded and dishonest. One might surmise it is simply because they have come to different conclusions than the Christian? As I have mentioned before - I really do love how much “The Gnu Atheists are slammed (see here, here, here  and here  - not to mention the plethora of Christian books responding to and making money off the New Atheism) for being arrogant, offensive, intolerant of religion (etc ad nauseam) yet believers seem not to notice when they do the exact thing they seem to despise, to atheists (see here and here) – but I guess it’s ok when you’ve got God on your side.

One wonders what their second point has to, specifically do, with a theistic worldview: ” in which there is joy and peace and love incomparable in this world”? Surely an atheist or a theist of a different stripe is free to hold notions of this kind? Moreover an atheist is welcome to believe in the ontological truth of this statement “and infinite incomprehensible in the next.” so again we ask – why would one need to accept theism and go further, to Christianity – when there is no need? One might also ask just why they think evangelism is such a positive thing? All we need do is look at this Christian news site, to see just how much harm comes to believers around the world, from other believers – surely a secular, enlightened way of thinking would help these parts of the world? At the very least we see, Christianity is not helping.

Reference

Kreeft P. J., Tacelli R.K. (2009). Handbook of Catholic Apologetics. San Francisco. Ignatius Press. P. 9.

Related articles
Categories: Apologetics

The unbearable wrongness of Stephens -c’mon ABC.

October 6, 2011 Leave a comment

Hot off his recent debate with Russell Blackford and others, Stephens isn’t smarting at all from his loss but has come out swinging over at the ABC website’s religion an ethics blog (in which he runs), in a piece entitled “The unbearable lightness of atheism“.

And a swing is exactly what it looks like.

Posting, as he notes, his thrust from the IQ2 debate, one is left to wonder just why he would post his losing argument to begin with, and why I am wasting the virtual ink to respond to it, when Blackford and co. did a far better job than I could.

I enjoy blogging, simple as that.

It is always amusing to note the language used by theists when discussing “The Gnu Atheism”, you’ll notice it generally takes the tone they claim said atheists do, ironic it is, and more than a little sad.

Stephens immediately goes for what I imagine most theists consider to be atheism’s job and weak point: morality. Of course anyone who’d spent 5 seconds researching atheism would realise atheism doesn’t have to explain anything, but hey, let us not let the facts get in the way of a good yarn.

It’s the same old yarn really, society in decline, morals run rampant, relativism, post-modernism. The problem is, as with most of the ABC’s opinion pieces, is there is very little room to elaborate and explain ideas, what we end up with is a mixed bag of assertions, which then yield to greater assertions:

It seems that we have reached a point in our national life where we are utterly incapable of reaching any kind of minimal moral consensus on fundamental questions.

What are the threats that we face in common? Where are those sources of corruption, perversion, addiction and even servitude that we ought to protect ourselves and others from? What virtues ought we to have and instil in others in order to make a robust civil society? What are our obligations to others – those living (including those who come to us from without our borders), dying and not yet born? What constitutes a good life? What ends do politics and the economy serve?

Such questions were once the subject of ferocious political and public debate; and, for better or worse, the Left and the Right believed there were answers, and that they had them. (Stephens, The unbearable lightness of atheism, 2011)

Hmm, that’s bleak, but I wonder, as Stephens does, who is to blame? Atheism?

There are few things today more fashionable, more suited to our modern conceit, than atheism. In fact, far from being radical or heroically contrarian, the current version of atheism strikes me as the ultimate conformism.

This is especially apparent in the case of the slipshod, grotesquely sensationalist “New Atheism” – invariably renounced by principled, literate atheists like James Wood, Thomas Nagel, John Gray, Philip Pullman and the late Bernard Williams – which poses no serious challenge to our most serious social ills and so has no other alternative but to blame our social ills in toto on religion.

Now, I don’t want to be misunderstood. I am not claiming that atheism is necessarily the cause of our modern predicament, much less that it is the root of all evil. To make such a claim would be to accord this variety of atheistic chic with too much importance, too much weight. (Stephens, The unbearable lightness of atheism, 2011)

I have to wonder, if the worst thing Stephens can say is that atheism is no longer “heroically contrarian” then we could, as atheists, say that “The Gnu Atheists” and the secular foundations (secular student alliance, ACLU, Freedom from religion foundation etc) have done their job, insofar as they have given atheists a voice and protected the rights of unbelievers – we no longer need to be heroic or contrarian. To which I say, thankyou!

I find it nevernedingly ironic that he claims “The Gnu Atheism”: ” poses no serious challenge to our most serious social ills and so has no other alternative but to blame our social ills in toto on religion.” when one could make the argument, and I am – that is the very thing Stephens is doing in his article.

It’s relieving that Stephens wishes to elaborate that atheism isn’t the cause of the worlds problems, but it does beg the question – why would he spend his first 12 paragraphs talking about a decline in society, then without preamble jump to atheism, simply to say that it’s not the cause of the moral decline? What, he just wants to rant about it anyway? If there is no hidden agenda here, then Stephens is simply really bad at coordinating a narrative.

But don’t think I’m strawmanning Stephens, he continues:

In a way, I think where atheism fits in our cultural moment it is more incidental than that. Our real problem today is the impoverishment of the modern mind, our inability to think properly about such elevated things as the Good, Beauty, Truth, Law, Love, Life, Death, Humanity, the End or Purpose of things, even Sex itself, without such ideas being debased by an incurious and all-pervasive nihilism. (Stephens, The unbearable lightness of atheism, 2011)

So it is, it’s not atheism that’s the problem, but nihilism (then we still ask – why is he discussing atheism at all?). Of course anyone who has read any apologetics would know this is what many apologists charge atheism with, claiming something to the effect of: this is where atheism leads us.  Even if this isn’t Stephens’ point, one has to wonder about his perception of the world. Are things so bleak to Stephens? Or are these simply the problems that accompany a theistic worldview, phrases like “the End or Purpose of things, even Sex itself” seem to be problems for the religiously minded individual, would these problems plague a persons worldview who bases such on the evidence?

Perhaps – we could always make the world better, but to assert that the modern mind is unable to properly think on these subjects seems asinine -  and not to mention self refuting since if this was true Stephen’s own dialogue here would be unacceptable – particularly when it’s done with the backdrop of atheism flowing in the background. If one is to tie together the narrative Stephens seems to have so much trouble doing – one may assume, after all, it is the atheists fault – for the supposed inability of the modern mind to think properly on ideals which are largely well solved in the secular life? This is circular.

Stephens continues:

And here we confront a desperate contradiction at the heart of so much atheistic hyperbole (accurately identified by Bernard Williams and others). The New Atheists rely heavily on the thesis that religion is the enemy of progress and human flourishing, and that once the last vestiges of religion are done away with, humanity will be far better off. But they also claim that all religion is “man-made,” and self-evidently so. This begs the question: if religion is indeed this all-pervasive source of corruption and prejudice and moral retardation, where do they believe that religion itself comes from, if not the human imagination? (Stephens, The unbearable lightness of atheism, 2011)

Stephens is, of course, building to his point, which will come to in a moment – for now we see a category error – to say that “The Gnu Atheists” are calling religion the problem and that religion comes from man, and therefore what does this mean – misses a few steps in reasoning. Let us leave aside the fact that no quotations are given, and focus on the argument – Stephens seems to assume that “The Gnu Atheists” think it is “man” who is the problem, but rather it is religion as an epistemological tool man uses that is the problem. “Man” (sorry for the masculine pronoun ladies) may have his faults, but that means religion is all the more dangerous – what “The Gnu Atheists” are saying, if we are to accept, rather generously, Stephens quoting of them – is that we need a more robust epistemological tool – one that draws conclusions from the evidence, not the other way around, one that allows investigation into it’s ideals (re: no dogma), one that takes the world as it is presented to us – things of this nature. Religion comes from the failure of “man” to understand and explain the intricacies of his world, from tradition and habit. But as we see, this is in decline.

Now we come to his point:

And so, it would seem that we are left with an unavoidable choice: either these atheists are really misotheists, God-haters, who rage against the very idea of God, the Good, Truth and Law, and so desperately try to will God out of existence; or their oft-professed faith in the inherent human capacity for progress is without justification; or the history of religion reflects the extraordinary human capacity to pursue the Good, as well as its equally pronounced tendency for Evil, idolatry and nihilism. (Stephens, The unbearable lightness of atheism, 2011)

The atheists, or rather “The Gnu Atheists” it seems after all – are a not the cause, but rather a symptom of our faulty society, their rejection of what Stephens calls “the Good, Truth and Law”, and their “desperate” push to “will” God out is but part of our world of sin (you just know he wants to say it)?  It is painfully sad to watch Stephens flounder around attempting listlessly to assign some kind of blame to a world he sees is out of control – of course it has to be those damn dirty atheists – after all, no all-powerful, all-knowing being could possibly be responsible for any of the supposed lack of “Good”, “Truth” and “Law” in the world – no, no , that would be ridiculous.

As far as “The Gnu Atheist’s” supposed faith in the inherent human capacity for progress which is apparently without justification (which again, asserted without evidence), we can simply say that all us over here in the sunny atheist camp are loving life, we’re living in a society with the least amount of violence and crime, some might say we are living in the best this world has ever been. Homosexuals, women and minorities are slowly coming to get their rights – despite what Stephens’ religion might have to say about it, sure the world has plenty to work on, no-one’s claiming perfection,  and we’re by no means done. Stephens continues:

It is apparent, is it not, that the current batch of chic atheists are but a symptom of a more general cultural decline, the steady impoverishment of what Hilaire Belloc perfectly described as “the Modern Mind,” which ceaselessly explains away its own moral deficiencies by projecting them onto God and banishing him into the wilderness.

It is just as apparent why such an atheism – with its cartoon versions of history, its theological illiteracy, it fetishisation of science, its hostility to the humanities and aesthetics, its flattened-out brand of morality as mere “well-being,” its cheap gags and mode of incessant piss-taking cynicism – should appeal so powerfully to a culture that has grown accustomed to the vulgarities and trivia enshrined in the modern media. (Stephens, The unbearable lightness of atheism, 2011)

It is here, that all I have been saying comes to fruition, I mean, come on ladies and gentlemen I implore  you – do atheists really have to take this baseless, crap, asserted without evidence? I don’t even have the energy to address this ad hominem nonsense except to quote Stephens from earlier, when discussing the “The Gnu Atheism”:

“which poses no serious challenge to our most serious social ills and so has no other alternative but to blame our social ills in toto on religion.” (Stephens, The unbearable lightness of atheism, 2011)

It’s ironic to see how high and mighty the pious are when judging those damn dirty atheists and how much people like Stephens fail to see their own hypocrisy. The above could easily be said of the meandering drivel Stephens has posted here, so in the end, he seems to be no better than the atheists he means to place the entire burden of modern civilization on.

Reference

Stephens S. (2011). The unbearable lightness of atheism. Retrieved October 5th, 2011, from http://www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2011/09/13/3316962.htm

Related articles
Categories: Apologetics, Atheism, Ethics, Secular, Theism

Barr on inerrancy vs literalism

September 14, 2011 2 comments

I recently read James Barr’s really enlightening book ‘Fundamentalism‘ whose main thesis was as the namesake suggests. Something that I hadn’t really considered before, was the difference between ‘literalism’ and ‘inerrancy’ and how this pertains to a fundamentalists reasoning.

It’s important to note at the outset, that defining a fundamentalist is tricky, the term is not used in a pejorative sense herein, but simply to describe a Christian that holds

(a) a very strong emphasis on the inerrancy of the Bible, the absence from it of any sort of error;

(b) a strong hostility to modern theology and to the methods, results and implications of modern critical study of the Bible;

(c) an assurance that those who do not share their religious viewpoint are not really ‘true Christians’ at all (Barr, Fundamentalism, p. 1, 1977).

Barr recognizes that these views are not held by all fundamentalists and that these definitions require expanding and elaboration, to be even in the ball park of ‘fair’ in their accuracy:  ‘complex social and religious movements are not defined in a few words’. But it gives you, the reader, a picture of what I’m talking about when I say ‘fundamentalist’.

Fundamentalists are concerned with minimizing error in the Bible- in fact they believe there are no errors in it, be they theological, geographical, historical or scientific. They are working under the less than Biblical (I will discuss that in a moment) assumption that the Bible is divinely inspired and infallible, but to keep a 2,000 year old tome like the Bible relevant with current scientific, literary and historical understanding, the fundamentalist will drop literalism to maintain that inerrancy has not been disrupted.

Genesis represents a perfect example of this:

“…most conservative evangelical opinion today does not pursue a literal interpretation of the creation story in Genesis. A literal interpretation would hold that the world was created in six days, these days being the first of the series which we still experience as days and nights. Not at all according to conservative evangelical sources; on the contrary, they are full of warnings about the dangers and difficulties involved for those who take the day literally… E.F. Kevan tells us that there are ‘serious difficulties’ in taking them as ordinary days… (Barr, Fundamentalism, pp. 40-1, 1977)

Barr continues demonstrating some of the apologetics used to get around the apparent ‘serious difficulties’ with the scientific contradiction that is Genesis- be it the days being ‘days of dramatic vision’, or that they do not ‘represent a twenty-four hour period’ but rather a ‘geological age’ or that the textual strategy is a ‘poetic figure’ (quoting Meredith Kline, p. 41). The problem with this being that the days are represented as having a ‘morning’ and ‘evening’ which seems to suggest the kind of day we experience. Again, the rebuttal being that the ‘day’ represents ‘clearly defined epochs’, not actual, literal days. How silly of us to read into it so. The point we are to take away, is that the Biblical authors are telling us that ‘God created the world out of nothing and that He did it in a specific period, which came to an end.’ (p. 41)

As we see, all kinds of contortions are made, to keep the Bible from being interpreted literally in this instance, moreover, at least in the passages of Genesis (Barr offers other examples taken as non-literal from Genesis- the genealogical lists from Adam to Noah, the specific creation account; i.e. light was created before the sun etc)  it is considered silly to interpret them literally.

But why is there a shift away from a literal interpretation of Genesis? Barr says it’s to do with the fundamentalists acceptance of science. The evidence for the age of the Earth, says Barr has become too strong for the fundamentalists to resist, a literal interpretation would mean

pitting the Bible against scientific truths which fundamentalist intellectuals now accept; this would in turn force the admission that the Bible in this respect had been wrong. In order to avoid this, the conservative interpreter moves over into a non-literal exegesis; only this will save the inerrancy of the Bible. (Barr, Fundamentalism, p. 42, 1977)

A hundred years ago, (probably less, says Barr, p.42) a literal interpretation would have been insisted upon, and if science had something contrary to say, science be damned.It’s not as if fundamentalism has given up the fight against science though, there still remains a resistance against evolutionary, climate, and stem cell sciences.

It needs to be reiterated- the fundamentalist does not, therefore, think that the Genesis accounts are fiction or myth, no, the characters, despite whatever ‘non-literal’ interpretation fundamentalists have of them, are still described as being real people, living in a real historical setting, in a real historical age.

There is a nice moment for the biblical critic when we realise that the Bible actually has very little to say about its own inspiration and inerrancy (indeed about itself at all). Barr reasons that this is due to that fact that there was no Bible as it was being written, it is only when we take an unhistorical look at the Bible, as the word of God, inspired and infallible from the beginning, that we can hope to make claims about what the Bible ‘said about itself’. This is why there are a paucity of passages in the Bible proper claiming it to be ‘inerrant’ (2 Peter 1:20 and 2 Timothy 3:16  for example), after all, what would the authors of these passages have been claiming was inerrant? ‘The scriptures’  was a reference to the OT, and even if these authors were aware of other books of the Bible, we have no way of knowing which ones they knew of, or which ones they considered to be authentic. Besides, even if 2 Peter and 2 Timothy were referring to their own passages as inspired, it would be a difficult burden of proof to meet indeed, to demonstrate they speak for the entire canon. This makes the claim of inerrancy by fundamentalists a philosophical and seemingly esoteric (not to mention circular) definition.

The fundamentalist will listen to the arguments of critical scholarship- when they hear questions like: ‘might the linguistic and literary form suggest that the passage is myth or legend?’ ‘Might it be mistaken in matters of historical facts?’ ‘Might it be something generated not by external events which occurred in this sequence, but by problems in the inner experience of the early church?’ (p. 51) Barr states however, that these kinds of questions are isolated and eliminated from the beginning of the fundamentalists exegesis, they may be considered but only insofar as they are forced to do so by the arguments of critical scholars- and even then it is only to fashion an appropriate apologetic.

Generally, theological necessity is a guiding light for what must be taken as literal and not, for example, the virgin birth is taken literally because its physical necessity is required for the Christian faith. The law that the seventh day be taken as rest however is not taken literally for precisely the opposite reason. Barr states that it is only upon criticism that passages lacking theological necessity are defended, not because they become theologically necessary, but rather due to the fact that fundamentalists need to at least maintain the appearance that the Bible contains inerrant true in the face of critical scholarship.

As we see, this makes for a confusing, muddled and completely individualistic way of interpreting the Bible- inerrancy is maintained by ‘constantly altering the mode of interpretation’ as Barr says (p. 46).

Barr concludes:

Literality, though it might well be deserving of criticism, would at least be a somewhat consistent interpretive principle, and the carrying out of it would deserve some attention as a significant achievement. What fundamentalists do pursue is completely unprincipled- in the strict sense unprincipled, because guided by no principle of interpretation- approach, in which the only guiding criterion is that the Bible should, by the sorts of truths that fundamentalists respect and follow, be true and not in any sort of error.

Inerrancy is the guiding light for the fundamentalist, with literalness being a varying nicety to be enjoyed if possible. If you do not share this perspective with the fundamentalist you are of course left to wonder, as I do, why anyone accepts this book, as the word of a God- when such contortions have to be made to understand it.

Related articles
Categories: Apologetics, Atheism, The Bible

Meta problems with minimal facts

August 27, 2011 Leave a comment

I was going to do a post discussing my personal thoughts relating to Habermas and Licona’s “minimal facts” approach, but upon re-reading Martin’s objections to the full list of 12 “minimal facts” Habermas has previously used (the authors only use 4 of those in this book), having agreed with his objections, and having referred you to them, I believe they are sufficient for my purposes here.

What I did want to do is a very basic treatise on, which isn’t mentioned in Martin’s book, are the meta problems I see with the authors “historical” approach to establishing (a) the supernatural, and by extension (b) the resurrection of Jesus via these minimal facts (obviously I’m not addressing all problems related to them, as I’d be going for days, simply those related to the problem below):

Testimony is never sufficient to establish a supernatural event or miracle

Firstly, what are Habermas and Licona’s “minimal facts”?

  1. Jesus died by crucifixion- p48
  2. Jesus’ disciples believed that he rose and appeared to them- 49
  3. The church persecutor Paul, was suddenly changed-64
  4. The skeptic James, brother of Jesus, was suddenly changed-67

The problem with using personal testimony to establish a miracle or supernatural event, lies in the fact that, if we allowed this, as an acceptable standard, we would then be required to accept all kinds of conflicting/contradictory reports, and supernatural claims. If we allow testimonial evidence to be sufficient to establish the above facts, but not the claims of other religious, or cultish sects, we are guilty of special pleading. Logic begs us consider a reliable method of detection.

If we restrict this, for our purposes, simply to religious claims (and not UFO or Elvis sightings which while not necessarily supernatural, are still extraordinary), I believe the first place we need to start, is revelation. Paul’s, James’ and the disciples supposed experiences and testimonies are used as evidence for the resurrection of Jesus (re: Habermas and Licona The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, pp48-67), presumably based on some form of revelation from God or personal experience.

I agree with Kai Nielsen (see Atheism and Philosophy, pp84-5, 2005) and Norman L. Geisler (see Christian Apologetics, p77, 1976 )  that we may not be able to discount someones revelatory experiences (as revelation is necessarily first person), there is however,  no reason for us to accept the exceptional as true, based solely on their word. As Geisler puts it, the experience may be enough to attest to the truth of that experience for that person, however

“truth finds its source in experience, but not its substantiation” (Geisler, Christian Apologetics, p77, 1976)

Habermas and Licona admit that natural explanations are preferable to supernatural explanations (p82), we must then consider Ehrman who has noted that due to the very improbable nature of miracles (by definition they are the least probable explanation), no matter how improbable the natural explanation for a supernatural event it is always more probable than a miraculous one (re: supernatural event) (for more see Ehrman’s book, Jesus, Interrupted, pp-171-9, 2009).  With that in mind, Richard Carrier explains in his book Sense and Goodness without God, that we can generally rely on testimony, but when we come across a single unexamined experience that runs counter to what is scientifically and logically well-proven we have good reason to reject that experience in favour of more trustworthy and analyzed explanations (p55). Habermas and Licona ostensibly agree with Carrier on p137 when they admit that science has indeed demonstrated that people do not rise from the dead:

“what science has shown is that a person does not rise from the dead by natural causes.”

The authors concede that the biblical testimony they offer in their “minimal facts” is counter to what is “scientifically well-proven”, hence making it subject to immediate skepticism, however they add:

“But this does not apply to Jesus’ resurrection since we are not claiming that Jesus came back to life naturally. The writers of the New Testament asserted that it was God who raised Jesus from the dead.” (Habermas & Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, p-137, 2004)

Does this objection help them though? Now they’ve entered the realm of circularity, as they have made no effort thus far to demonstrate the existence of a god or god’s, which begs the question: is the resurrection evidence for God, or is God evidence for the resurrection? How can they simple assume the Christian God into the equation, without first, demonstrating the existence of such an entity,  that this being would want to bring about Jesus’ resurrection, and indeed, how it did so?

Carrier offers us a natural explanation for the rise of early Christianity: all we would need,  is the belief that the resurrection occurred:

“There is nothing that an actual resurrection would have caused that could not have been caused by a mere belief in that resurrection.” (Carrier, Sense and Goodness without God, 242, 2005)

A Christian may still claim a naturalistic bias (which would be ad hominem), however we see that even in the historical method, testimony is not considered to be very reliable in setting up any historical claims, natural or otherwise, in the sense that, it is the least reliable piece of evidence we can gather, Carrier outlines categories of evidence:

“First, what I call “physical-historical necessity.”
Second, direct physical evidence.
Third, unbiased or counterbiased corroboration.
Fourth, credible critical accounts by known scholars from the period.
Fifth, an eyewitness account.” (Carrier, Sense and Goodness without God, p242, 2005)

As we see, testimony begins at third on this list! Even if we deemed testimony to be worthy of demonstrating the supernatural or the miraculous resurrection of Jesus, Habermas and Licona still have to explain how they’re doing it, with the very worst of evidence! They concede that the historical method is not relevant to their case on p135 when they mention that the historian may not actually be able to detect that the resurrection of Jesus occurred since he is

“unable to detect God’s actions with the tools of his trade.” (Habermas & Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, p-135, 2004)

Implying as I’ve stated previously that they must engage in theology/apologetics to discover it, which makes it not a historical search anymore, but rather a confirmation of previously held ideas and beliefs, this may explain why they allow the abundant use of testimony to establish the supernatural.

Continuing, not only is testimony by itself horrible evidence to set up the resurrection, we then have problems with the testimony given in the Bible. For a meta discussion on the Bible’s reliability we turn to Ehrman, again from his book; Jesus, Interrupted (see also Crossan, Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography, ppX-XIV, 1994 for a similar diatribe), who states that we don’t have any autographs of any books of the Bible, only copies written centuries later, all of which have been tampered with and many of them are pseudonymous (e.g written in the name of an Apostle by someone else) (pp12-3). No biblical authors were Jesus contemporaries (the Gospels,were written decades later by unknown authors) (p12), and in the case of Paul, whose testimony is integral to Habermas and Licona’s “minimal facts” effort, did not even meet Jesus in person, only 7 of his 13 letters are considered to be authentic, Acts (the story of the Disciples lives after Jesus execution) is considered to be written around 85-90 C.E, about 25 years after Paul’s death, which makes information about him less than reliable and the Pauline Corpus itself is filled with discrepancies (pp53-6) (for a full elaboration see pp63-70). This is why I charge the authors here with attempting to sneak in inerrancy. They address very few, to none of these concerns within biblical scholarship, they simply assume the Bible as true, or that scholarship is on their side (see Martin’s, The Case Against Christianity, pp88-9, 1991, for more on this).

Christians might chime in that we have corroborating evidence of Paul’s and James’ conversions, and the disciples experiences, which might increase the probability of the resurrection, but it seems to me, confirmation of Paul’s, James and the disciples experiences, via testimony, by the Apostolic fathers and extrabiblical sources (assuming, rather generously their reliability) decades or even hundreds of years later, helps us little, and is circular, given that testimony itself is the very issue at hand.

Finally I want to talk about special pleading, which I believe Habermas and Licona are engaging in, in their defense of the resurrection via testimony. Throughout history there have been other miracle claims by other religions and cultish sects; Apollonius of Tyana, whose miracles, healings, casting out of demons, resurrection (and reappearance to his disciples) are all reported by Philostratus via oral tradition, and Apollonius’ closest disciple Damis in his diary (Price, The Case Against the Case for Christ, pp154-6, 2010). We have the charismatic messiah Sabbatai Sevi, in the 17th century, of whom “contemporary records, rumours and reports survive” (which is all better evidence than that for Jesus’ resurrection). (Price, The Case Against the Case for Christ, p155, 2010). As Price continues, there are also the dying and rising god religions of Baal, Osiris and Tammuz whose rituals and followers are attested to in the Bible itself (see Price, The Case Against the Case for Christ, p157, 2010, for the full details).

There are more examples, Richard Carrier, again in his book Sense and Goodness without God discusses the pagan god Asclepius who has surviving “testimonies to his influence and healing power throughout the classical age are common enough to fill a two-volume book.” We have first hand testimony to his miracles by those healed at his temples, which continues on for centuries (from 4th century B.C.E to 3rd century C.E), going all over the mediterranean. (Carrier, Sense and Goodness without God, p233, 2005). There is the emperor Vespasian who was thought to have cured the blind and lame, and statues with healing powers were common attractions for the sick people of this era (p233). Lunar eclipses were thought to be a monster devouring the moon, or witches using diabolical spells, so when an eclipse occurred people would bang pots and blow horns, to scare away the demons. The list goes on, Proteus Peregrinus (who resurrected), Alexander of Abonuteichos etc all attested to by testimony! When Habermas and Licona dismiss other accounts of religious or cultish miracle workers and sects which are attested to via testimony as they do implicitly (as they are Christians making a case for Jesus’ resurrection) and explicitly (on pp92,142) they are engaging in special pleading.

Conclusion

The fact that believers believed in their religious experiences is no more to the point than any other believer believing in the truth of their deity and experiences, or for that matter, me attempting to justify my atheism because I “feel that it’s true”, or  because  “I don’t have experiences of a god or gods”.

We see that establishing the supernatural via testimony is impossible as it would force us, if we wished to avoid special pleading, to accept all claims given by testimony. We see that even if one doesn’t accept this, we still can’t use testimony that is contrary to established scientific and logically well-proven data. Even if one doesn’t accept this,  by the authors own admission natural explanations are more preferrable to supernatural ones , we see that miracles by their definition are the least likely events to happen, and that any natural explanation is prima facie more probable than a supernatural one, hence a fallible human belief in the resurrection as opposed to an actual resurrection is far more likely. Still, if one doesn’t accept this either, we see that testimony itself is the worst kind of evidence we can have to establish a natural event, hence it would almost certainly be insufficient to establish the supernatural. Still oh obstinate one, if you do not accept that, there is the unreliability of the Biblical account of the resurrection and the resulting testimony and subsequent confirmation by extrabiblical sources (re: decades to hundreds of years later, which Habermas and Licona don’t accept for other supernatural claims).  Again even, if by some insane chance, you accept none of the above, we see that other religious and cult leaders death, resurrection and miracles are established by testimony, viz our first point, if we wish to avoid special pleading we have to accept these as true, if we’re going to accept the resurrection.

From this do I conclude that Jesus was in fact not raised from the dead? Well, no, I don’t make such a claim, only that the evidence I’ve been presented with thus far, is unconvincing to me. I’m a fallabilst, I could be wrong, and I don’t go so far as to say what I’ve written here is complete, I’m sure there are many logical and factual errors, as well as much more that could be said on the subject. But hopefully this investigation gives you some insight into why I don’t accept, at the very least, Habermas and Licona’s portrayal of the events.

References

Carrier R. (2005).  Sense and Goodness without God. Bloomington, Indiana. Arthur House. pp-55,233,242.

Crossan J D. (1994).  Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography. New York, New York.  Harper Collins. ppX-XIV.

Ehrman B. (2009). Jesus, Interrupted, New York, New York. Harper-Collins Publishing. pp-12-3,53-6,63-70,171-9.

Geisler N L. (1976).  Christian Apologetics. Grand Rapids, Michigan. Baker Book House Company. p- 177.

Habermas G R., Licona M R. (2004). The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus. Grand Rapids, Michigan. Kregel Publications. pp-48-9,64-7,82,135,137.

Martin M. (1991). The Case Against Christianity. Philadelphia. Temple University Press. pp-88-9.

Nielsen K. (2005). Atheism and Philosophy. Amherst, New York. Prometheus Books. pp-84-5.

Price R M. (2010). The Case Against the Case for Christ. Cranford, New Jersey. American Atheist Press. pp-154-7.

Related articles
Categories: Apologetics, The Bible

Loftier musings on some of the problems with the minimal facts approach

August 23, 2011 4 comments

Reading through Habermas and Licona’s The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus,  I’m struck by their interesting argument via “minimal facts”, I’m not a complete illiterate, so I’ve heard of this argument before (for skeptical objections see Michael Martin’s The Case Against Christianity pp87-100), and have seen it proposed in several different forms (Craig uses a similar formula to defend the empty tomb- for skeptical objections see Robert M. Price and Jeffery Jay Lowder’s edited The Empty Tomb), the one presented in this book they call “4 + 1″ as in there are 4 facts they consider to be well attested by biblical scholarship and 1 less so, but still very well attested, that establish the resurrection of Jesus.

The main problem it seems to me, and I’m making an assumption here I know, but the authors think they’re making a case, possibly the best and only case for a supernatural event ever, right? If they are or not it’s not integral, my point is;

do they really think minimal facts are appropriate to establish evidence for a supernatural event?

It seems to me “minimal facts” shoots itself in the foot before it even begins. We don’t ask for minimal facts for natural events (re: physics, cosmology, biology etc), why would we do so when establishing the existence of  an all-powerful deity who can… (insert all it’s powers and abilities suitable to your religious faith here).

Now some theists may be thinking that I’m biased, basing my critique of “minimal facts” theory on ECREE, which I’m not, necessarily, whether you subscribe to ECREE or not, surely you agree that a supernatural event, any supernatural event, bears a heavy burden of proof, that requires solid, reliable and presumably a lot of evidence to corroborate it. Are “minimal facts” going to get the job done (I would ask you if “minimal facts” would convince you of someone elses religious truth)?

I’m planning on doing a proper discussion of their work eventually, I promise. I’ve got some stuff down as a response to their 4 facts, I need more space than I have here to present my objections though, so you’ll have to wait just a little while.

Related articles
Categories: Apologetics, Atheism, The Bible, Theism

Bias

August 23, 2011 1 comment

I’m currently reading Habermas and Licona’s book The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, and immediately I’m confused about whether I’m reading apologetics or history:

At some point in the Christian walk, many believers ask some difficult questions: Is Christianity really true? Are there any good reasons to know which religion is true? Could it be that God does not really exist?” (Habermas & Licona, p-13, 2004)

This seems like circular reasoning to me, they’re assuming the very conclusion they’re attempting to show. They’re not investigating whether the resurrection of Jesus occurred and if there’s evidence to support it, they’re already there, its just a matter of ticking the boxes now.

Am I to assume when reading this book that they’re doing apologetics, bracketed around some genuine historical research? How am I to know which is which? Sure there are historical elements to their book, but it seems from the outset, they’re supporting inerrancy (they admit on p44 that the Bible is “inspired” and trustworthy” and on p45 that the Bible tells them to believe in Jesus’ resurrection to gain eternal life), however much they’re denying that’s what they’re doing:

“We cannot tell you we looked at the evidence without presuppositions or bias. Facing issues of this magnitude, it’s  unreasonable to think that anyone comes to the investigation with no personal hopes or preexisting beliefs.” (Habermas & Licona, p-13, 2004)

This appears to be simply a smoke screen, they’re attempting to demonstrate that even I (and you) have presuppositions (which of course we do), but are all presuppositions created equally? Are my presuppositions, whatever they may be, on par with being committed to inerrancy? I find that hard to swallow. As we see later on:

“The Christian has the Holy Spirit who testifies to her that Christianity is true and that she belongs to God. The historical certainty we have of Jesus’ resurrection only re-inforces that God’s Spirit has indeed spoken to us.” (Habermas & Licona, p-33, 2004)

Again, circular; the word of God is true, because God told them, then the evidence also supports the inerrancy of God’s word? I’m not sure where to get off of this dizzying ride. They’re trying to bring in believers by showing them that they’re good Christians who believe in the word of God, but they also realise they’ve got a job to do in presenting the facts.

I have to conclude that much of what I’m reading is simply designed to curry favour with believers, to reinforce their faith, which makes the authors historical research suspect at the very beginning.

Of course it would simply be ad hominem to disregard their arguments without addressing them, but this kind of behaviour is exactly why Christian biblical scholarship is so hard to take seriously. It’s the same with Strobel’s book The Case for Christ: so much in that book  is circular, uncritical acceptance of biblical inerrancy it’s difficult to take much, if any of it seriously (see Robert M. Price’s review in his book The Case Against the Case for Christ to see what I’m talking about).

I don’t want it to seem all doom and gloom though, I actually care about whether these authors have anything (reliable?) to say, I do have a modicum of respect for them (Licona in particular), and I’m sure they’re just peaches in real life.

I shall continue to read and ponder on the mysteries of the Christian faith…

Reference

Habermas G R., Licona M R. (2004). The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus. Grand Rapids, Michigan. Kregel Publications. P-13,44,45,33.

Related articles
Categories: Apologetics, The Bible

The sickening apologetics of Ravi Zacharias

August 17, 2011 2 comments

I’ve been collating my references the past week, putting the annotations I’ve attached to the books I’ve read into an excel spreadsheet for easier access when writing blogs or discussing issues and I came across this oldie but a goodie.

Christianity is often sold as this worldview of superior morality, that Christians are and should be humble, fair, harmonic, kind and good (Lewis, Mere Christianity, pg XV,73, 2002. Moreland, The God Question, pg 86, 2009 etc ) yet is this always the case? Well it seems only when they’re talking about their specific “in” crowd. How do apologetical authors discuss those not in their “in“crowd? Let’s let Ravi take us through a tour of just how fair and kind a Christian can be about atheism…

Atheism drove Nietzsche insane:

“Nietzsche wanted to look life squarely in the eye, with no God to obstruct his vision, and the picture he saw was agonizing to his mind. He saw no vast mind behind the framing of this world; he heard no transcending voice giving counsel to this world; he saw no light at the end of the tunnel, and he felt the loneliness of existence in its most desolate form.” (Zacharias, pg 27, 2007)

Atheism is supported by evolution which gave (*ehrm* the Catholic) Hitler his ideas for the Holocaust (not Luther?), which was propelled by an “atheistic worldview“:

“If atheism gains life-sustaining support from atheistic evolution, then it cannot shut the floodgates to the tidal waves of its philosophical implications… the theory of the dominion of the strong over the weak is not the abuse of natural selection; rather it is at the heart of it. Hitler unintentionally exposed atheism and dragged it where it was reluctantly, but logically, forced into it’s consequences.” (Zacharias, pg 63, 2007)

On atheist intellectuals:

“To be an intellectual is a great privilege, but to be an intellectual without God is dangerous.”  (Zacharias, pg 67, 2007)

On atheists self alienation:

“The great struggle for meaning, encompassed with a deep sense of alienation, is a necessary condition of the atheistic worldview.  (Zacharias, pg 73, 2007)”

Atheism is just depressing:

“Atheism walks with its head down, earthbound, which is why it grasps nothing of eternal value. It must admit its predicament: without God, there is no meaning to life.”  (Zacharias, pg 87, 2007)

Atheists have no hope or morals (oh an we’re junkies):

“Having killed God, the atheist is left with no reason for being, no morality to espouse, no meaning to life, and no hope beyond the grave…Those who do not have hope, in an effort to drown their despair, turn to drugs or alcohol or other experiments that they think will break this stranglehold of futility.”  (Zacharias, pg 98, 2007)

Now, what atheists have to do, you think it’s going to be positive?

“… atheists must make sense out of a random first cause, denounce as immoral all moral denunciation, express meaningfully all meaninglessness, and find security in hopelessness.”  (Zacharias, pg 106, 2007)

Atheists are blind (and despots):

The atheist misses this glimpse through larger eyes than his own. Such a person is confronted with a universe that is intelligible and mysterious. But, in the despotism of his naturalistic worldview, such a person attempts to remove the mystery and only succeeds in decimating the intelligence.”  (Zacharias, pg 122, 2007)

Atheists just want to live a life of sin, that’s why we don’t believe in a god or god’s:

“The atheist’s biggest struggle comes here. A man or woman rejects God neither because of intellectual demands nor because of the paucity of evidence. One rejects God because of a moral resistance that refuses to admit one’s need for God.”  (Zacharias, pg 155, 2007)

Ravi has, I’m sure, given us all something to think about, and has indeed shown, that Christianity does contain the highest morality possible, certainly superior to any other type (be it secular, Islamic etc). He’s convinced me, all praise be to Jeebus.

References

Lewis C.S., (2002). Mere Christianity (50th Anniversary Ed.). Hammersmith, London. Harper-Collins Publishers. Pp- XV, 73.

Moreland J.P., (2009). The God Question. Eugene, Oregon. Harvest House Publishers. Pp-86.

Zacharias R., (2007). The Real Face of Atheism. Grand Rapids, MI. Baker Books. Pp- 27,63,67,73,87,98,106,123,155.

Related articles
Categories: Apologetics

Norman Geisler on circular reasoning

August 15, 2011 1 comment

…one cannot argue that the resuscitation of Jesus of Nazareth’s body- granting that it did resuscitate – is an act of God (miracle) that proves Christian theism to be true. For only if this is already a theistic universe to begin with can one even interpret this event to be a miraculous resurrection or act of God. If to interpret an event as a resurrection or act of God presupposes God’s existence, then an event so interpreted cannot be used as proof of God’s existence. (Geisler, Christian Apologetics, p. 139, 1976)

Geisler N L. (1976).  Christian Apologetics. Grand Rapids, Michigan. Baker Book House Company. P. 139.

Related articles
Categories: Apologetics
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 32 other followers

%d bloggers like this: