Omnipotent God and The Paradox of the Stone

May 21, 2013 By 5 Comments

The concept of an omnipotent being, namely a being with maximal perfection with respect to power, is sometimes believed to involve a contradiction. The most popular reductio ad absurdum case against the existence of omnipotent being is known as “the paradox of the stone.”

The paradox unfolds as follows:

1. If God exists, then He is omnipotent
2. If God is omnipotent then God can create a stone too heavy for anyone to lift.
3. If God can create a stone too heavy for anyone to lift, then God is not omnipotent since He cannot lift the stone He created.
4. If God cannot create a stone too heavy for anyone to lift, then God is not omnipotent since He cannot create the stone too heavy for anyone to lift.
5. Either way God is not omnipotent.
6. Therefore God does not exist. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Answering Classical Atheists, Agnostics and Adversaries of Traditional Christianity, Defending Essential Doctrines with Philosophy, Philosophical Apologetics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Is Naturalism Rational? The Self-Defeating Epistemology Behind Evolutionary Theories of Cognition (Part 1)

May 6, 2013 By 1 Comment

This is Part 1 in a 3 part series on evolutionary theories of cognition. This part discusses C.S. Lewis’ Argument from Reason. Part 2 will examine Alvin Plantinga’s Argument from Proper Function and part 3 will cover Plantinga’s Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism.

No matter how contentious an intellectual debate may appear, both parties agree on at least one thing. They both assume that rationality, if properly used, leads to true conclusions. The laws of identity, non-contradiction, and excluded middle, for example, accurately describe reality.1 If human perceptions about these basic truths were incorrect, then it would be impossible to reason to any conclusion.

Theists argue that this necessary presupposition is incompatible with a naturalistic worldview. If naturalism is true then rationality is not reliable, undercutting all beliefs including acceptance of naturalism itself. Arguments of this genre are coined “arguments from reason.”

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Argument from Reason, Arguments from the phenomena of our inner mental life Tagged With: , , , ,

Book Review: Sam Harris’ Lying

September 16, 2012 By Leave a Comment

“The 9th commandment defended” is my four words review of Sam Harris’ 26 paged book “Lying”. Harris succeeded to convince me “that lying, even about the smallest matters, needlessly damages personal relationships and public trust”.

Harris is simply at his best in this noteworthy essay to which I, as a Christian theist, do concur with him in all areas but one major issue, namely the ontological wrongness of lying and one minor issue found in “Lies in Extremis”, viz., if truth could be an “hypothetical lie”. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Book & Movie Reviews, Can We Be Good without God? Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Review of David McAfee’s Disproving Christianity and Other Secular Writings – A Sample

September 6, 2012 By Leave a Comment

In anticipation of the forthcoming publication of David McAfee’s 2nd Edition of Disproving God and Other Secular Writings coupled with my full book length review of it, I thought I would here post the preface to the second edition of my review. Something to whet the appetite I hope:

What follows is a revision of my original review of David’s first edition of Disproving Christianity, Refuting the World’s Most Followed Religion which has now been updated and republished by Dangerous Little Books under the new title Disproving Christianity and Other Secular Writings. For those of you who may be reading this and thinking that I am simply hounding him, rest assured that this is an agreed upon project by David and myself. In anticipation of a book that we are working on together that will be a dialogue on various issues regarding both Atheistic Naturalism and Christian Theism, we agreed that it would be beneficial to release an updated version of his second edition bundled with my book length review. David and I have a very cordial relationship with each other and often hold public discussion on various internet threads – especially in his Facebook group. I noticed upon reviewing his second edition that David did seem to take some of my original critiques to heart (though not nearly as much or to the degree as one would hope) and he did adjust his tone, phrasing, or arguments to be more accurate on several points.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Book & Movie Reviews Tagged With: , , ,

Case For Rational Atheism

August 31, 2012 By Leave a Comment

“Negative atheism in the broad sense is then the absence of belief in any god or Gods, not just the absence of belief in a personal theistic God,” contended Michael Martin in The Cambridge Companion to Atheism, “and negative atheism in the narrow sense is the absence of belief in a theistic God.” He went on:

Positive atheism in the broad sense is, in turn, disbelief in all gods, with positive atheism in the narrow sense being the disbelief in a theistic God. For positive atheism in the narrow sense to be successfully defended, two tasks must be accomplished. First, the reasons for believing in a theistic God must be refuted; in other words, negative atheism in the narrow sense must be established. Second, reasons for disbelieving in the theistic God must be given.(Martin 2007: 1)

I found the idea of negative atheism, namely absence of belief in a person theistic God (as I narrow to Christian theism in this article) wanting. In this first part of outlined case for rational atheism, I do not take to account negative atheism since if a person p lacks a belief in x, then this by itself expresse the psychological state of person p which does not necessarily align with outside reality. For example, I lack a belief in the existence of gold in Pluto. My lack of belief shows my psychological state, which does not necessarily aligns with whether it is true or false that there is gold in Pluto. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Answering the Problem of Evil, Suffering and Hell Tagged With: , ,

You Cannot Prove The Existence Of God!

August 20, 2012 By 13 Comments

I was an atheist when I first said that to a Christian more than 40 years ago. I must say it felt pretty good to say those words. It makes one feel superior to tell a person they cannot prove something they believe. Most Christians I said that to personally and on my radio talk show either crumbled or exploded at that point. Either reaction was fine with me.

I am no longer an atheist, but still believe the statement to be true. We cannot “prove” the existence of God, but we don’t have to. [Read more...]

Filed Under: FSM + Russell's Teapot + Burden of Proof Tagged With: , , ,

Responses to Challenges from the New Atheists and ‘Nones’

August 16, 2012 By 1 Comment

Over the last few months, I have been posting responses to some of the challenges coming from the (new) atheists and the “Nones” (those who profess no religious affiliation or faith).  What I have done here is provided you with a listing of those responses from the Real Issue blog, so that you have a collection of them for your reference.  By no means is this an exhaustive listing.  These challenges are some of the ones  that I have been asked to address, since this past March’s visit to The Reason Rally on the National Mall.  Know that there will be more coming in different postings but in the meantime, here is that listing for your reading edification:

Challenges from Atheists: Did the Universe begin to exist?
Challenges from Atheists: Is religion delusional?
Challenges from Atheists: Can one be moral without God? 
Challenges from Atheists:  How do you define a miracle?
Challenges from Atheists:  Is or is not atheist a worldview?
Challenges from Atheists:  Why do you believe in the Christian God?

I will be posting more responses to objections in the not too distant future.  I am catching my bearings with church ministry transitions and trying to organize our planning toward the start of a Ratio Christi club at the University of Mary Washington this coming semester.

We covet your prayers and any encouragement you might be led to share.

Filed Under: Affirming Miracles, Atheism Is Not a Belief?, Can We Be Good without God?, Concerning the "Nones", Cosmological Fine Tuning, Does Life or the Universe Need a Creator?, Why the 'Christian' God? Tagged With: ,

Atheists Are People, Too!

August 2, 2012 By 12 Comments

Richard Dawkins, Richard Carrier, Barry McGowan, Christopher Hitchens, Bertrand Russell, Madalyn Murray O’Hair — they all had one thing in common — they are or were people. They also happen to be or were well-known atheists.

I was quite taken with Madalyn Murray O’Hair at one time. I never met her, but had the opportunity to talk with her more than 40 years ago when she was a guest on a radio talk show I produced. I was a young atheist and looked up to her and Bertrand Russell (he was still alive at the time) as examples of what I wanted to be in society — a freethinker who opened the minds of the masses to think for themselves — unhampered by the dictates of religion. I didn’t think of Madalyn or Bertrand as anything other than people speaking their mind. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Practical Issues and Testimonies Tagged With: , , ,

Who Really Holds the Crutch? Christianity or Atheism?

July 27, 2012 By Leave a Comment

It was the 19th century atheist Ludwig Feurbach (1804-1872) who stated that “Religion is a dream of the human mind…in these days, illusion is sacred, truth profane.” (Religion and Humanistic Atheism, xxxix).

And of course who can forget the famous quote of Karl Marx (1818-1883) in response to his criticism of G. W. F. Hegel’s “Philosophy of Right”, “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of the soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.”

I introduce this posting with these quotes because one of the most popular objections coming from atheism is the charge that Christianity (via-a-vis belief in a supernatural being who is personal, infinite, moral, and transcendent, called “God”) is a psychological crutch. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Is Christianity Just a Wish or Crutch? Tagged With: