I wanted to make a distinction that I think is a very important foundation for having any discussion about religious/atheist matters. Whenever I have engaged religious people of any particular denomination eventually it becomes apparent that my talking partner falls into one of two categories. Its not quite as simple as dividing the religious into these camps since there are many subsets that individuals can fall into but broadly speaking there are people who:
1. Have the objective of believing what is true, as far as they can discern.
2. Have the objective of believing what they want to be true, as far as they can convince themselves.
As far as I can reckon the vast majority of religious people in the United States whether they be Catholic, Buddhist, Pantheist or any other specific grouping seem to be of the first variety. This phenomenon doesn't appear to be confined to any geographic region or limited to certain gender or ethnic demographics. Just about anybody can be part of the first category.
The second group contains people who fall along certain lines. An example will illustrate. When I was younger I liked to debate ferociously. So I found a group of evangelical Christians who were willing to engage me to an extent but soon I found out that they were less concerned with discovering truth than they were with reinforcing their presuppositions. That wasn't the interesting thing though. What was of interest was the demographics of this bunch. About 80% of them were women who had either grown up in poverty or who had just gotten out of unpleasant relationships. The remainder was made up of closeted gay men. I did not think much of this at the time but gradually as I became older I took note that a large proportion of the most devoted and inflexible religious people in this nation from national level politicians to the rank and file citizens had very personal reasons for not dealing with reality.
So from this point on I'd like to divide the blog into two separate sections. Differing pages will deal with reasonable religious people and the wing-nut religious people. It should be quite productive because for the secular community two almost completely different strategies need to be employed if any productive conversation is to be had with the religious. Later!
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
Confounding Cosmology
Apologists are generally on the defensive when it comes to scientific evidence. Its not surprising since none of the evidence supports supernatural claims and at absolute best it remains silent on typical religious positions. Given all of this, the opportunity to grab hold of a scientific theory and stretch it to kind of, maybe support one of their common theological positions is too good to pass up. The Big Bang or some version of it is usually one of the only hypotheses that apologists latch on to. This doesn't work any better than any other apologists' claims but these various "cosmological arguments" seem to be some of Christian advocates' (and other monotheists') favorites to try and push on the public.
Well, Billy Craig has one of these in his repertoire called "The Kalam Cosmological Argument". Like most other positions Billy takes, he has trouble summing up succinctly just what it is. He also has the tendency to laden his explanation of it with overly emotional phrases (exploded into being? What does that even mean?). Here's the basic form of it though:
1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.
Now, even if we buy all of three of these nothing thus far implies that this cause of the universe is the Christian God. Nor does it lead to the conclusion that this cause is a monotheistic god or even a god (however abstract) at all. Before we even raise these objections though we have the problem of obfuscation. The first proposition never specifies just what "begins to exist" means. The word "cause" also suffers from the same lack of definition. In the second premise we have "the universe", even though that term lacks a definition. So from these two premises that are so poorly explained we get a conclusion that amounts to nothing.
Why does Billy Craig bother with any of this? Lets go back to premise two. In the colloquial sense many people, including scientists who study this subject matter, will often say that "yes, the universe began to exist", however this is not quite accurate. No one knows if the universe had a beginning. Some would say, more accurately, that "the universe as we know it" may have begun to exist but this is different from the more broad statement that "the universe" in its entirety began to exist.
The only reason he bothers with the second premise is that the leading scientific theory that describes the history of our universe sounds like it implies something sort of like what he claims. However, that is not what any version of the Big Bang theory states. Simply put, without going into specifics, all the various scientific theories say is that at some finite time in the past the universe was different from the way it is now. They don't make the claim that there was "nothing" (Lawrence Krauss definition aside). They don't assert that there was a "beginning" either. In fact the entire notion of a temporal beginning may not even apply if a certain version of the theory is true. In addition the idea of a "beginning" hinges entirely on what one means by the word.
When did the earth "begin" to exist? One could say that after the material in the accretion disk around our star coalesced into the planets, the earth being one. Then again the earth has been absorbing material via comet and asteroid impacts for much more time then that. Maybe we'd better say that the earth began to exist a few hundred-million years after the birth of the sun. Or perhaps we could say that the earth began to exist when the collision that produced the earth-moon system took place. Then again there was a large object orbiting our star before that collision which one could call the earth.
Another example: When did I "begin" to exist? When I was born or when I was conceived? Well the material in my body at the moment was added over the course of a number of years so I suppose that the early versions of me were not really me, just similar people that happened to live a number of years ago and now I am their successor. Or perhaps memory and personality are the crucial components. One's personality changes throughout their lives though as the have new experiences. For that matter what about people with brain damage who suffer perceptual or personality changes... you see where this gets us.
I don't know why those who have debated Billy Craig don't just shut him down immediately on this point. "Begins to exist" has either no meaning in this context or can have any meaning that Billy so chooses and he is free to change that meaning at any point during his ramblings given that it is not elaborated at the start. Given that the second premise fares no better, and certainly has no connection to anything scientific, what we wind up with is philosophical gibberish at the conclusion. Still, if Billy can keep boring people by making all of this nonsense extraordinarily verbose like he always does then maybe the crowd will assent to it in the hope that he'll stop talking.
Next time: The Bible is right because it told me so
Well, Billy Craig has one of these in his repertoire called "The Kalam Cosmological Argument". Like most other positions Billy takes, he has trouble summing up succinctly just what it is. He also has the tendency to laden his explanation of it with overly emotional phrases (exploded into being? What does that even mean?). Here's the basic form of it though:
1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.
Now, even if we buy all of three of these nothing thus far implies that this cause of the universe is the Christian God. Nor does it lead to the conclusion that this cause is a monotheistic god or even a god (however abstract) at all. Before we even raise these objections though we have the problem of obfuscation. The first proposition never specifies just what "begins to exist" means. The word "cause" also suffers from the same lack of definition. In the second premise we have "the universe", even though that term lacks a definition. So from these two premises that are so poorly explained we get a conclusion that amounts to nothing.
Why does Billy Craig bother with any of this? Lets go back to premise two. In the colloquial sense many people, including scientists who study this subject matter, will often say that "yes, the universe began to exist", however this is not quite accurate. No one knows if the universe had a beginning. Some would say, more accurately, that "the universe as we know it" may have begun to exist but this is different from the more broad statement that "the universe" in its entirety began to exist.
The only reason he bothers with the second premise is that the leading scientific theory that describes the history of our universe sounds like it implies something sort of like what he claims. However, that is not what any version of the Big Bang theory states. Simply put, without going into specifics, all the various scientific theories say is that at some finite time in the past the universe was different from the way it is now. They don't make the claim that there was "nothing" (Lawrence Krauss definition aside). They don't assert that there was a "beginning" either. In fact the entire notion of a temporal beginning may not even apply if a certain version of the theory is true. In addition the idea of a "beginning" hinges entirely on what one means by the word.
When did the earth "begin" to exist? One could say that after the material in the accretion disk around our star coalesced into the planets, the earth being one. Then again the earth has been absorbing material via comet and asteroid impacts for much more time then that. Maybe we'd better say that the earth began to exist a few hundred-million years after the birth of the sun. Or perhaps we could say that the earth began to exist when the collision that produced the earth-moon system took place. Then again there was a large object orbiting our star before that collision which one could call the earth.
Another example: When did I "begin" to exist? When I was born or when I was conceived? Well the material in my body at the moment was added over the course of a number of years so I suppose that the early versions of me were not really me, just similar people that happened to live a number of years ago and now I am their successor. Or perhaps memory and personality are the crucial components. One's personality changes throughout their lives though as the have new experiences. For that matter what about people with brain damage who suffer perceptual or personality changes... you see where this gets us.
I don't know why those who have debated Billy Craig don't just shut him down immediately on this point. "Begins to exist" has either no meaning in this context or can have any meaning that Billy so chooses and he is free to change that meaning at any point during his ramblings given that it is not elaborated at the start. Given that the second premise fares no better, and certainly has no connection to anything scientific, what we wind up with is philosophical gibberish at the conclusion. Still, if Billy can keep boring people by making all of this nonsense extraordinarily verbose like he always does then maybe the crowd will assent to it in the hope that he'll stop talking.
Next time: The Bible is right because it told me so
Friday, October 5, 2012
The Three that are One
Well, I thought I was going to just tackle one of Billy Craig's points in this post but on re-listening to some of his usual crap I figured that I could dispense with three of the five in one go. They are:
1. The Direct Experience of God or "Spirit Energy Ectoplasm Stuff is Sent Directly Into your Brain from the Magic Man."
2. The Existence of Objective Morality Proves that there is a God or "Billy Craig Likes How Some Stuff in an Old Book Sounds so Therefore He's Correct"
3. The Teleological Argument or "God Exists Because Billy Craig Says So."
Now most of us know what is wrong with the first one. Unless you're willing to take any idiot claim that somebody was hearing voices or seeing images or otherwise had "funny feelings" on their inside and then just assume those subjective happenings prove the existence Bigfoot, aliens or Jesus then we can safely ignore number one. We have no way of determining the truth or falsity of such propositions... so that goes in the trash right from the outset.
The Next one doesn't fare any better. Here is usually where Billy boy goes on a long tirade about how secular moral values aren't really moral. And after spending several long minutes on that he fails to ever explain why his so called "objective morals" are really moral. Finally, the position he falls back on is that "God done said it"... and that's why things are moral. Verifying that God even exists and that he said anything would be a start Billy. Odd thing is that he never ever addresses just what the hell morality is in the first place. He never bothers to give an account of morality other than, if God says it, then its moral. Funny that this is an argument for God since you have to assume the very thing that you are attempting to prove. Circles are fun.
The Teleological argument falls in the same category as a whole host of constructs aimed at proving that God exists by pure philosophy. None of them work and the TA is one of the more spectacular failures. The crux of it is that the definition of God entails that he must exist. Hmmmm... The Abominable Snowman is a cryptozoic entity that has been living in the Himalayan mountains for thousands of years and he also exists... Therefore the Abominable Snowman exists. Do I need to elaborate further on why this kind of reasoning doesn't fly? Simply saying that something exists doesn't make it so.
So three of Billy Craig's five points, after his long and boring recitation of them, claim that God exists cause' he just does. Now Billy's tiny little fan club plus some professional apologists might think that these propositions are amusing but most regular people don't. In fact this can be quite annoying when people show up to a venue and are expecting decent public discourse on interesting and pertinent issues, then we hear this nonsense for close to an hour and a half. Please Billy if you want to stay in the game come up with something better.
Next Time: Kalam the Klown
1. The Direct Experience of God or "Spirit Energy Ectoplasm Stuff is Sent Directly Into your Brain from the Magic Man."
2. The Existence of Objective Morality Proves that there is a God or "Billy Craig Likes How Some Stuff in an Old Book Sounds so Therefore He's Correct"
3. The Teleological Argument or "God Exists Because Billy Craig Says So."
Now most of us know what is wrong with the first one. Unless you're willing to take any idiot claim that somebody was hearing voices or seeing images or otherwise had "funny feelings" on their inside and then just assume those subjective happenings prove the existence Bigfoot, aliens or Jesus then we can safely ignore number one. We have no way of determining the truth or falsity of such propositions... so that goes in the trash right from the outset.
The Next one doesn't fare any better. Here is usually where Billy boy goes on a long tirade about how secular moral values aren't really moral. And after spending several long minutes on that he fails to ever explain why his so called "objective morals" are really moral. Finally, the position he falls back on is that "God done said it"... and that's why things are moral. Verifying that God even exists and that he said anything would be a start Billy. Odd thing is that he never ever addresses just what the hell morality is in the first place. He never bothers to give an account of morality other than, if God says it, then its moral. Funny that this is an argument for God since you have to assume the very thing that you are attempting to prove. Circles are fun.
The Teleological argument falls in the same category as a whole host of constructs aimed at proving that God exists by pure philosophy. None of them work and the TA is one of the more spectacular failures. The crux of it is that the definition of God entails that he must exist. Hmmmm... The Abominable Snowman is a cryptozoic entity that has been living in the Himalayan mountains for thousands of years and he also exists... Therefore the Abominable Snowman exists. Do I need to elaborate further on why this kind of reasoning doesn't fly? Simply saying that something exists doesn't make it so.
So three of Billy Craig's five points, after his long and boring recitation of them, claim that God exists cause' he just does. Now Billy's tiny little fan club plus some professional apologists might think that these propositions are amusing but most regular people don't. In fact this can be quite annoying when people show up to a venue and are expecting decent public discourse on interesting and pertinent issues, then we hear this nonsense for close to an hour and a half. Please Billy if you want to stay in the game come up with something better.
Next Time: Kalam the Klown
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