February 15, 2008 by Andy
These lectures (video or audio) are recently given at Dallas Theological Seminary.
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The Domain for Truth 
Can you sum up the arguements and statements in the lectures? Just give one- it makes it easier to evalute if it is of any value.
Samuel,
Thanks for stopping by and commenting.
Please forget these lectures is you are an atheist because it will be too long and we probably will not get to interact.
But if you have to listen to one lecture only, I would suggest a debate between Greg Bahnsen and Gordon Stein. This is the most famous debate between a Christian and an atheist.
You can download the debate from the link below,
https://veritasdomain.wordpress.com/2006/12/05/greg-bahnsen-vs-gordon-stein-the-great-debate/
I would love to hear your review of it.
Can’t get the frecking file to open!
From the comments it appears it is another one of those “atheism presupposes theism” claiming that you need God for reason, justification for understanding the universe and morality.
Or it could be the olontological arguement, design arguement, existance arguement, best of all worlds, scriptural, historical, good deeds, communism, purpose, religious experience… come on, just choose ones from the list. If they aren’t on the list you can add it.
Samuel,
I have just checked, the links are all working. Try again.
Its not on the list. That is why you have to listen to it.
Tried the second link to the transcipt. It works!
Anyway, errors-
Yes, you do find out those things the same way as you do a box of crackers.
barometric pressure, quasars, gravitational
attraction, elasticity, radio activity,
natural laws, names, grammar, numbers, the university
itself that you’re now at, past events, categories, future contingencies, laws of thought,
political obligations, individual identity over time, causation, memories, dreams, or even love
or beauty
The second half is more subjective stuff, that he is erroniously lumping together. Natural laws don’t exist (in the term he means), names are human constructs, as is grammer. I don’t think there are “laws of thought” (could be psychology). Love is an emotion, beauty is partly subjective and partily empirical.
Political obligation is under morality.
In fact the stuff in the list that isn’t covered by science is covered by philosophy.
But all fields have one thing in common- they all use evidence.
How is it a fallacy? You can find out if something exists by looking at it? He doesn’t explain how it is a fallacy- he just implies that it is by fiat.
The reason logic, reason and evidence work in understanding the universe is they are designed that way. Evidence is learning about the universe by examining it, logic and reason are uncovering things about the universe based on the fact that certain things are inherently impossible in it. In short they work in uncovering information about the universe because they take advantage of how the universe works.
He makes the design arguement! Always happens… Then he uses the bible twice- once as history, then as god’s living word.
The reason he doesn’t allow supernatural explanations is they are false by default. Anything that operates in the universe is by definition natural. If god existed he would consider himself a natural phenomena, as would humans. After all, it has to be natural if it is in existance (I not refering to natural v sythetics here). So scientists dismiss people who use “supernatural” because it simply means they are trying to hide their dearth of evidence.
He pulls a “gods ways are mysterious”
I have no such presumptions. Seriously, I don’t. So that invalidates the whole “everyone has presumptions”.
Pretended neutrality? Science really is neutral- he is calling it a fallacy because it doesn’t get the answers he wants.
God is special because he is not natural. And so are ghosts and tarot cards and… If it operates in our bloody universe it better bloody be natural.
The arguement isn’t over worldview’s- it is over facts. And there is only one answer to facts- one person is wrong.
He does the “atheism presupposes theism”.
How many times? Atheism isn’t a worldview!
Atheism doesn’t account for intelligible experience, science, logic, or morality, because atheism doesn’t concern itself with that. Atheism concerns itself with one question “do you believe in god?” and one answer “no”.
Skipped through the atheist- I think he has similar arguements.
I stopped at this point- my guesses were dead on.
Couple pointers-
All the arguements the theist made were wrong- if you like I can tell you why
Naming your site “the domain for truth” is… funny. If you don’t get why here’s a hint- Pravada.
1.) “yes, you do find out those things the same way as you do a box of crackers.
barometric pressure, quasars, gravitational
attraction, elasticity, radio activity,natural laws, names, grammar, numbers, the university itself that you’re now at, past events, categories, future contingencies, laws of thought,
political obligations, individual identity over time, causation, memories, dreams, or even love
or beauty”
Response: You do not know about these things the same as one knows whether a box is in the pantry, which is the point the debater was making.
To make the point, tell me in the following order how does one know about:
a.) A box of cracker being in the pantry
b.) Barometer pressure
c.) Quasars
d.) Gravitional attraction
e.) Elasticity
f.) Radio activity
g.) grammar
h.) numbers
i.) past events
j.) future contingencies
k.) political obligation
l.) Causality
m.) Memory
2.) “But all fields have one thing in common- they all use evidence. How is it a fallacy?”
Response: The issue is not that there is evidence in the respective field of studies. You need to listen carefully. The issue concern about the fallacy of assuming that the same standard that would rule something as ‘evidence’ in one field would be the same standard to determine what is an evidence in another field.
3.) “He doesn’t explain how it is a fallacy- he just implies that it is by fiat.”
Response: He did explain it. But then if you didn’t realize what fallacy he is describing, it would not be a suprise that you would miss what his explanation.
4.) “Evidence is learning about the universe by examining it,”
Question: Where did you get this definition from? Curious.
5.) “logic and reason are uncovering things about the universe based on the fact that certain things are inherently impossible in it.”
Response: HOw do you know somethings are universally inherently impossible (ie, the Laws of Logic)?
6.)”He makes the design arguement! ”
Response: Two things. Where did he make the design argument?
Moreover, I wonder if you know the design argument. Therefore, summarize the design argument please.
7.)”Then he uses the bible twice- once as history, then as god’s living word.”
Response: Are you saying he used the Bible as evidence for God’s existence during his presentation? Give me the quote and its context.
8.) “The reason he doesn’t allow supernatural explanations is they are false by default.”
Response: WHat default? How do you know it is false by default? Prove this to me.
9.)”After all, it has to be natural if it is in existance (I not refering to natural v sythetics here).”
REsponse: How do you know that only natural entity exists? Is it logically necessarily so? If so, demonstrate.
10.) “So scientists dismiss people who use “supernatural” because it simply means they are trying to hide their dearth of evidence.”
Response: Two problems here. Which scientists? Are you talking about all scientists? Again, which scientists are you talking about, let’s not get vague here.
Secondly, you are committing the fallacy of ad hominem; instead of dealing with the issue of naturalism, you go ahead and attack the character of those who subscribe to supernaturalism by asserting that “they are trying to hide their dearth of evidence.”
Moreover, prove to me how you know that those who believe in the supernatural are “trying to hide their dearth of evidence”.
11.) “He pulls a “gods ways are mysterious””
Response: Explain to me where did he used it and why did he say this.
12.) “I have no such presumptions. Seriously, I don’t. So that invalidates the whole “everyone has presumptions”.”
Response: Two things. The guy was not talking about presumptions. Again, you have to learn to listen carefully. He is talking about ‘presuppositions’.
Secondly, do you know what a presupposition is? Then we’ll go on from there to see if you have presuppositions.
13.)”Pretended neutrality? Science really is neutral- ”
Response: Marshal forth an argument defending the neutrality of science, instead of just asserting it.
14.)”Science really is neutral- he is calling it a fallacy because it doesn’t get the answers he wants.”
REponse: He did not call science a fallacy. This is inaccurate, and you have committed the fallacy of straw man by misrepresenting his beliefs.
Moreover, prove to me how you know his motive that he allegedly called science a fallacy (which he did not) because “it doesn’t get the answers he wants”.
15.)”Atheism isn’t a worldview!”
Response: Define me what a worldview is.
16.) “Atheism doesn’t account for intelligible experience, science, logic, or morality, because atheism doesn’t concern itself with that.”
Response: Atheism undermine the foundation for morality, science and logic. That was the Christian debater’s point.
17.) “All the arguements the theist made were wrong-”
Response: What were all his arguments? List them. What was wrong about it?
Wow! This response is so thorough and well thought out. You just took him apart piece by piece.
I bet you a million the atheist will come back with nonsense arguments by claiming you got him all wrong.
Since he had attacked your blog (The Domain for Truth) which has nothing to do with the arguments, he might as well attack your father, mother, grandfather, grandmother, uncle, aunties, grand uncles and grand aunties.
And yet he says it not a world view, perhaps so, maybe its just a world view with a bad attitude!
Barry,
Thank you Barry for taking the time to read this.
I think you might be onto something in your description of our atheist friend…I really would not be suprised if he responds in the fashion you described.
Samuel,
I had reckoned you would conclude or comment as you did. Even Gordon Stein himself (who was the debater) could not account for his arguments. In fact, he wasn’t able to understand the Transcendental Argument for the first six month after the debate despite the explanations by Greg Bahnsen. If Dr Stein who is one of the leading atheist/secularist could not comprehend in the debate and the subsequent six months, I would not expect you to understand it right away.
Therefore, listen to the debate again (again and again if you must). And then read these two articles,
https://veritasdomain.wordpress.com/2007/12/01/the-atheist-challenge/
https://veritasdomain.wordpress.com/2007/12/08/the-atheist-challenge-part-2/
After reading them, try to answer these questions,
1. How do you account for the laws of logic?
2. How do you account for the laws of morality?
Also Mr. Skinner,
Don’t forget about comment number 6, which is my interaction with your comment.
I’m back… lets see….
1) The first half are evidence based questions. You know crackers are in a pantry by using sight. All the others use the same mechanism, except you have to have an instrument to check them (quasers you need a teloscope). The difference is simply that are senses aren’t adequate for the task on their own, not that they don’t use senses.
g.) grammar- convention and arbitrary
h.) numbers- sybolic representation of reality
i.) past events- see memory
j.) future contingencies- see memory
k.) political obligation- see morality
l.) Causality- see nature of the universe
m.) Memory- see memory
Memory is a chemical phenomena in your brain where the nerve cells manage to store representations of past events. Technique for discovering- MRI, radioactive tracers, dissection, etc.
Grammer is completely arbitrary- although the specific forms are partially hard wired into our brains (there are some patterns not found in any language) that is about it. Grammer is simply how we arrange words- nothing more and nothing less.
Numbers are symbols- a code. They were developed to make accounting easier.
Morality- basically what are our obligations to other people? Why? If you aren’t already a good person, I can’t answer with anything other than “or else”.
Nature of the universe- unknown. We know it has to be orderly- a completely choatic universe could cause itself to cease to exist. Aside from that we have to find out empirically.
2) Difference things are required for evidence in each field, and so are different levels of corralation. However there must always be at least a positive corralation between two phenomena for the two to be determined to be correlated or caused. The general required accuracy is usually determined by the instruments and their margain of error.
3) I just showed why it is a fallacy.
4) Dictionary. Even if it doesn’t work, I’ll use “we examine the universe to understand the universe”. Self explanatory really.
5) The Greeks designed them, not me. Their criteria was that if it lead to a contradiction (aka couldn’t occur in reality) it was logically impossible.
6) God created the universe/living things. Simple really. Those are the two. The answers science gives are self-caused and chemistry/evolution. Yeah, we need the chemists and physits to work on it some more.
7) I’m refering to the great debate written transcript first section. Can’t reach it from this site anymore. Could you repost the link?
8, 9) Natural refers to all things that exist in reality (or things that are none sythetic). If god exists he is in reality. Supernatural is technobabble, but for religions and magicians.
10) All scientists, by definition look for natural causes to phenomena.
11) A presumption is something you hold true without evidence for it.
12) Science is based on studying reality. Reality is neutral by default- or a Colbert would put it “polls are based on what people think in reality, and as we all know reality has a liberal bias”.
15) A worldview is a system used to interpret and sift evidence and to assign roles to other individuals and yourself.
16) Read the early Greek philosophers. They deduce, step by step, why you don’t need gods for morality.
17)That was the whole post dude.
Dang- I can’t find the transcript. It would be under Great Debate somewhere… this is annoying. The closest I found was you guys fighting over the transendant arguement.
Hey there guys! I’m planning on listening to the debate soon, but wanted to dailogue a little bit.
Samuel, I am getting a little confused by your comments. You seem very intelligent and systematic, which I definitely admire. It seems that you have no trouble addressing the universe with a “how” question (how do things come to be, how do we get here, how did things start, etc.) These are all questions that, in theory, can be answered by scientific inquiry.
Where I get a little muddled is the oddness that you even debate this topic. By debating it, you seem to imply that the universe has an answer to the ‘why’ question, and believe that accepting an agnostic or atheistic viewpoint would help to advance that purpose.
This seems a little contradictory to me.
“Memory is a chemical phenomena in your brain where the nerve cells manage to store representations of past events.”
Is it anything more? Does it serve a purpose?
“Grammer is simply how we arrange words- nothing more and nothing less.”
Is it anything more? Does it serve a purpose?
If there is no purpose in the universe (or in communication) but everything is ‘just’ matter flowing according to physical laws, then it begs the question of even debating something like this. This has me a little confused and seems like a serious logical contradiction. My only conclusion is that you are trying to have your cake and eat it to. In one sentence the claim the premise that there is no ultimate purpose, but in the next sneaking in a premise that men should not believe in a deity – implying a sense of purpose for mankind. Am I reading you wrong?
Sorry. I took so long. The answer to your why question: no- there is no ultimate purpose. There are lots of proximate purposes (memory serves the purpose of allowing an organism to learn), but no ultimate purpose. I hope this helps.