Category: Apologetics

More Nonsense of the New Atheists.

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism

More Nonsense of the New Atheists.

The new atheists claim that they do not bear the burden of proof in their argument against God because atheism is not a belief but rather it is a non-belief. Right, atheists nor anyone else, is able to prove or disprove a non-belief. Nor can they argue for or against a non-belief. In fact, you cannot even speak about a non-belief other than simply to say, “I do not believe it”. A non-belief is nothing and how can you possibly speak of nothing? However, I know of only a handful of intellectual atheists who are consistent and refuse to speak about the subject of God.

If you are arguing for or against something you are not arguing from a state of non-belief because that is impossible. If you argue, you must be arguing from some other position or ideology than a non-belief. You cannot as, most atheists do, argue against God and then claim atheism as a non-belief. Atheists must argue against God from either naturalism or a materialistic worldview and both of these ideology’s depict a belief system. As soon as the atheist appeals to these ideologies to prove his atheism he shoulders the burden of proof. In other words, the minute the atheist open their mouths using naturalism or materialism to support his atheism he assumes the burden of proof.

In essence, they have to borrow or steal beliefs from other ideologies to support their un-belief in God. If they don’t want any burden of proof, they should simply shut their mouths and not form arguments from either materialism, scientism or naturalism. Of course, this will not happen because the majority of new atheists are filled with beliefs, emotions and appetites by which they feel compelled to justify their beliefs or should I say un-belief. Therefore, they will continue to use the meaningless argument of having no burden of proof to justify their endless talking and arguing about a subject they say does not exist. Nonsense!

The Nothingness that is Something

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism, Science

The Nothingness that is Something

What is the nothingness that is outside space-time, i.e. that which was before space-time existed? You might be saying hold on, you can’t speak about nothingness, because nothingness means nothing. Does it? Does not the law of causality say that something cannot come from nothing and that the cause must be equal to or greater than the effect. So, when we say that something came from nothing are we not violating the law of causality? Yes, that is why reason will take us to a something instead of a nothing. And it is science that gives us insight to what this something is like.

What do we know about the nothingness that is outside space-time? If we accept the law of causality, we also have to accept that whatever the universe came from, must be greater than the universe. This tell us something about the prime mover; It, He or She must be extremely powerful. So powerful that It is beyond a humans capacity to understand and articulate. This deduction is based on the fact that anything in which existence came out of, must have had its origin in the prime mover. This means that everything, to some degree, was somehow a part of this prime mover before space-time existed. Therefore everything that exists, existed in Him and came forth from Him in some way.

Therefore, whatever we see or experience in the creation was in some form a part of the prime movers consciousness before the beginning of time–space and this constitutes a part of his nature. The implications of this are staggering. Since we see in the creation a mind, or consciousness, this would necessitate, based on the law of causality, that the prime mover would possess consciousness far superior to everything in the creation, for the creation cannot be greater than the creator. We might refer to the consciousness of the prime mover as super consciousness. What would super consciousness encompass? For one thing, it would include super knowledge. We could say it was all knowing; for the essence of all things was designed, created and made by its consciousness.

On the other hand, nothingness is the void created when something is removed, or it is the absence of something. For example, darkness is the absence of light, darkness in itself is nothingness. In like manner, evil is the absence of good and it is equal to anarchy or chaos. Chaos is the absence of order or you could say the absence of law. The reason the universe is a cosmos and not a chaos is the fact that there are laws that govern it[1].

Because there are laws in the universe we can also know that this super consciousness is principled and creates laws to govern all things. These laws reflect the very nature of the uncreated one. There is no corner of the universe that is not controlled by his laws. This is the reason and the grounds or foundation on which we reason, do science and mathematics. Without the first principle of philosophy, which states that the world is an orderly place governed by principles or laws, there would be no reasoning, science or mathematics. It is unbelievable that some mindless force would create these laws. If there are laws then there must be an intelligent being that created them. It would follow that because there are principles and law, there has to be a something and not nothingness.

Some have responded by saying that they can believe in a super consciousness, but not in one that has a personality[2]. But why not? If that quality that we call personality exists, which we know it does for we each share in it, why would not a super consciousness have a super personality and even the emotions associated with personality. Emotions like super love which would be the complete negation of hate and fear. Of course, super personality and how it is integrated with super consciousness would be impossible for humans to understand seeing we cannot understand our own consciousness, personality and emotions.

Science tells us that there are four forces in nature; gravitational, electromagnetic, strong nuclear, and weak nuclear forces. However, there is one that they have missed. That force is life. All life is a force that acts on the material world and can copy the prime mover by making decisions and acting on them. In the Greek language the word for this life force is called spirit. We know that all living things have a life force that animates them and gives them the unique thing that we call life. Because there is life we know that the prime mover must be in itself the giver and very essence of life. As the prime mover does not exist, for he is existence. He likewise does not have life, but rather he is life or spirit. It is interesting to note that Jesus said that God is spirit not a spirit[3]. We might interpret spirit as a life force that has personality.

From the above we can gather that super personality and super consciousness is beyond our understanding and beyond our languages ability to explain. It is beyond dispute that we cannot comprehend the Wholly Other but we can apprehend Him by studying the things revealed about him in His creation, this includes the study of nature. From a biblical perspective this would especially include man for the Scriptures say that man was created in the image and likeness of the super consciousness.

[1] The law of causation is being question by some scientists that are trying to justify their materialistic worldview.

[2] I do not believe in a personal God that does my personal bidding. However, I do believe in a super consciousness that knows how many hairs are on my head.

[3] John 4:24.

What Do Rocks on The Ground Prove?-Evolution and The Fossil Record

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism, Science

What Do Rocks on The Ground Prove?

Evolution and The Fossil Record

 

One huge problem with Darwinian evolution is not the theory itself but rather those evolutionists who believe it and who say the evidence for it is in the fossil record. However, when asked about the anomalies and other problems with the fossil record, they will say the problem is that the earth tends to erase its history and therefore the fossil record is not complete, which may be true. But if the fossil record is complete enough to say that Darwin’s evolution is a fact[1], it seems it should be complete enough to answer the anomalies and other problems that the fossil record presents. The truth is that evolutionists have made so many claims about the fossil record that it hard to know the truth from fiction. The truth is that fossils are just like rocks lying on the ground. The narrative that you give to explain them comes partially from preconceived ideas, one’s imagination, and one’s indoctrination. However, absolute knowledge of how they actually got there is unknowable unless you were there to witness it, and the only way you could get that kind of knowledge is to create a time machine to carry you back in time so you could witness those past events. The problem is that for many evolutionist the narrative has become the facts and the evidence in itself. In other words the map has become the territory.

The other day I saw a truck dumping a pile of rocks on the ground. I wonder what the explanation of this event would look like 10,000 years after a great ice age had erased human history, a time when there were no dump trucks. How do you think the rocks would be explained? Do you think mankind would just throw up their hands and say there are no answers to the rock pile, or would they come up with a convoluted story? What kind of story would they come up with if they were told they could not make any appeal to intelligence of any kind, and that they would have to explain it totally by citing natural causes?

Let’s take my illustration of stones on the ground and analyze it using the scientific method. The question would be: How did the stones get on the ground? For the fun of it, let’s use some real stones. Let’s look at the rocks at Stonehenge, which is a prehistoric monument in Wiltshire, England. The fact is that these stones are sitting on the ground in an orderly fashion in Wiltshire, England. With this observation, we have the facts that there are rocks on the ground and they are arranged in an orderly fashion. Next comes the question: How did the rocks get there? Then we would have to come up with a hypothesis or a guess of how they got there. Well, because they are arranged in an orderly way, we would think it safe to infer that an intelligent creature was involved in placing them on the ground. Of course, that is an assumption, something which we had inferred from the order and design of Stonehenge. So this data that points to design would rule out any hypothesis that an act of nature alone placed them there, or at least it makes it highly improbable. Therefore, we could eliminate the theory that stones were placed by glaciers, volcanoes, or the shifting of the earth. Now, I have heard a few hypotheses about those stones and how they were placed on the ground. (1) They were placed by a deity. (2) An alien life form from space placed them on the ground. (3) Lastly, somehow ancient man placed them on the ground through some method as yet unknown. All these theories have one thing in common. They all have an element of intelligence built into them based on the intelligent order of the stones.[2].

Now, here is the problem. The Stonehenge stones are prehistoric. In other words, they were placed before recorded history began. There are no written records of how they got there and there are no witnesses left alive that were present at their placing. This means that if I put together a narrative or a story of how these stones came to sit on the earth the way they do; it would have to come from my imagination more than the facts, for the facts end with their existence and their orderly placement. They have no story to tell other than they exist in their order. If I am good at spinning a story with graphic details, one could write a textbook and even make a movie of how the stones were set on the earth. If I was really good, I could come up with a whole scientific scenario which would explain how they got where they are, but no matter how detailed or graphic the story was, it still would only be a story made up by my imagination. However, if the story was told enough times by people, others would begin to believe the story to be a fact. It still would be only a myth. You see, man is incorrigibly gullible and will fall for a good story every time. In fact, the more unbelievable the story, the more likely they will fall for it. The bigger the lie, the more believable it becomes. The reason for this is that people cannot believe that anyone would have the arrogance and audacity to tell such a story.

What about applying the scientific method[3] to discover the truth about the stones? The scientific method will not work for the question of how the stones got there for two reasons. Though the facts can be observed (the rocks on the ground), the way they got there cannot be observed, and the scientific method requires the observation of the thing being studied or questioned.[4] The question is how the rocks got on the ground. You can observe the rocks on the ground, but you cannot observe how they got there, for it was a onetime happening, which took place before recorded history and cannot be observed. Therefore, the scientific method cannot be applied. The scientific method also requires experimentation to verify one’s hypothesis. There is no experiment that could reproduce the erection of the stones. How could there be, seeing as we know nothing of how they were first erected? We could bring in equipment, e.g., bulldozers, excavators, and cranes and reproduce the site, but this would not be re-creating the original erection or construction method. The new model that we erect would prove nothing more than the original facts, i.e., that there are stones on the ground and that an intelligent being erected them. In view of this, we have to conclude that any hypothesis about how Stonehenge was constructed would be nothing more than a guess and would not be science and could never be called a fact of science.

To say that the knowledge we have of Stonehenge is not based on science is not earthshaking, but what if we apply the same logic to the fossil record? The truth is that fossils are like the stones of Stonehenge. They’re just there. In themselves, they have no story to tell other than the one we read into them. And what story do we read into them? It is a story that was popularized by Charles Darwin; one he created without any scientific evidence that natural selection had ever produced a new species.[5] Darwin had heard these stories of how evolution happened from his father and grandfather all of his life. When he sailed to the islands on the ship H.M.S. Beagle, he did not go as an unbiased bystander, but rather as man on a quest to prove a preconceived idea. He surely did not come to his conclusion by the scientific method nor did the scientific community of his day which accepted his theories without any evidence. Their beliefs in his story came out of a need to tie together or complete a naturalistic way of looking at everything. The result was that the scientific method was completely ignored when it came to the new science of evolution. It was given a pass because the only other explanation would be God, which the scientific community could not accept. Necessity is the mother of invention and we can add, it is the mother of some unbelievable stories.

Another example of a tall tale is the story of the caveman, which is used to support the evolution story or could it be that the evolution story is used to support the caveman story? Either way, it goes something like this: Once upon a time there were hairy ape-like creatures that lived in caves in Europe and elsewhere. The caveman creature was the ancient ancestor of modern man but quite primitive in his morals and mating practices. The caveman was less intelligent than we are and secured his food by hunting. He painted pictures on the walls of his caves, and we know that he knew how to use primitive tools because we have found them in caves with some of his remains. He was so different from us that he was not the same species and could not interbreed with us Homo sapiens.[6]

How much of the caveman lore is based on science and how much is based on the preconceived idea of progressive evolution read into the fossil evidence? The facts that are based on science, which can be proven, are very few. The actual facts tell us that there were some men in the past who sometimes inhabited caves. However, there are probably more living in caves today than there were then. At least some of these prehistoric men used tools and could draw pictures. That’s it for the science. The rest of what you have learned about cavemen is fiction and came from the fertile imagination of those who could spin a fine tale.

Here are a few things that are based on modern man’s assumptions, which in turn are based on our belief in progressive evolution. The caveman was less intelligent than we are. He had a lot of hair all over his body, a protruding jaw, huge eye sockets, a large sloping forehead, all of which is actually the description of one of my neighbors. Maybe my neighbor is the missing link. Back to the unscientific gibberish. He was a brute and forcibly mated with the females of his species. He carried around a club to subdue the females. He was a polygamist and had a herd of females with whom he mated. He lived permanently in caves. In actuality, this sounds like a want-to-be list for a lot of American males.

But did he really live in caves or were they just temporary shelters in severe weather, or were they places of worship? Could they have been safe places for woman and children? Could the picture on the walls of the caves have been done by children, like children write on the walls of their bedrooms as my children did? I know, for I had to clean the writing off. Could caves have been a burial ground like the Pyramids in Egypt, a stronghold in time of war, or maybe a nursery for the kids?

All this was said about cavemen to point out there are many things we assume to know, which in truth, we are actually quite ignorant of. It would seem that much of what we call science and history is nothing but speculations drawn from our imaginations and presented as facts.[7] We tend to blindly trust the system of authority which teaches these things without anyone questioning the source of its facts and its interpretation of the facts. These authorities propagate their assumptions by setting themselves up in privileged positions of authority in our universities and schools, leaving the impression that they have special access to the truth, which sounds a little like priest craft to me.

The answer is for us to start asking a similar question as the one which God asked Adam: “Who told you that?” We need to ask this question to ourselves and of other men we are listening to. This includes those in our universities. We also need to learn how to distinguish or discern the difference between the facts and people’s interpretation of the facts. You will find that this is very difficult for most people and involves a great deal of thought and practice.

[1] Evolution is a fact, you see it taking place everywhere in the creation. However, Darwinian evolution is not a fact but only a theory.

[2] What would you say of a discipline or men who told you to ignore the design and come up with a theory of how the stones got there without making any appeal to intelligent design? Is not design in this case a self-evident truth?

[3] The scientific method is a systematic system used by scientists to logically form their conclusions. (1) Frame a question. (2) Collect the data. (3) Create a hypothesis. (4) Do experiments. (4) Make observations. (5) Try to falsify the hypothesis. (6) Publish your findings to the community for review.

[4] Hypotheses without tests are no more than cocktail party chatter and are without value except perhaps as entertainment. They are not science. (My emphasis) Henry Gee, Deep Time Henry Gee is a senior editor at Nature. He holds a PhD in Zoology from Cambridge.

[5] The Road of Science and the Ways to God by Stanley L. Jaki Page 282, the University of Chicago Press.

[6] This has just been debunked by DNA studies at Harvard. Harvard Gazette, January 29, 2014.

[7] Henry Gee in his book Deep Time gives a realistic history of what we know and what we don’t know about the history of the earth.

I Believe (An essay on science and faith)

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism, Faith, Religion, Science

Author:  Skip Reith

Date:  9/26/2015

I Believe

I believe!  These two little words contain a lot of power.  These two little words are also misused, misunderstood, abused, and often ridiculed.  What do we mean when we say I believe?  That is what I will explore today.

Belief is that understanding a person has when they analyze and process all of the facts and information they have on a particular subject.  Belief can come from direct observation (I’ve been to New York so I believe it exists); or belief can come from indirect information – that is from an authority on the subject (I’ve never been to Tokyo, but I believe it exists because I have been told by maps and people who have been there that it exists).

One important note before I continue.  When I use the term authority here, I am not talking about some governmental organization.  I am talking about an expert on the subject whose knowledge, skill, and background gives them a special place in the hierarchy of understanding on the subject.  An authoritative source is one step up from an expert.  If the authoritative source is a person then that source not only is an expert, but that person also has a breadth and depth of knowledge around the main subject that allows them broad understanding on the subject.  If the source is not a person, then the source is complete and detailed.  For example, a professional astronomer with 30 years experience is an authority on astronomy.  The complete body of written papers and books on astronomy is an authoritative source on the subject.  In addition, an authority on the subject is one that other people agree and believe is an authority on the subject.  Is possible to think a person is an authority on a subject when they are actually not an expert and may have little knowledge in the subject.  (This technique is used all of the time by advertisers.  They get a famous person to promote their product.  Since people know the authority of the famous person’s specialty, they subconsciously assign authority to this other, advertised subject as well.)

Let’s look at belief in more detail.  Belief and knowledge are similar, but not identical.  Belief is your understanding of a situation, but you may not be able to prove that understanding to another.  Knowledge is a direct understanding of something that you can easily prove.  I know one plus one equals two and I can prove it in a number of ways, including demonstrating the summation with two pennies.  I know New York exists (or at least it did) because I was there.  I cannot prove its existence now because I am not there.  I can show evidence of my trip (pictures and souvenirs) but until I go back I can’t definitively prove its existence.  So, at the moment I believe that New York exists.  My belief in the existence of Tokyo is indirect.  My only proof is the maps and pictures I have seen of Tokyo.  If someone does not accept the authority of my proofs then they will not believe in Tokyo.

Science is the attempt to quantify beliefs and turn them into provable knowledge while authenticating the proofs.  The scientific method (described in my Observation – Applying the Scientific Method to Religion) is a disciplined approach to proving an understanding and turning belief into knowledge.  For example, I could apply the scientific method and fly to Tokyo and prove to myself that it exists, turning my belief into knowledge.

The problem with science is that it can only prove physical things.  It can prove the existence of matter and the existence of something called gravity, and so on.  It can dig out the understanding of how things function and explain the interactions of various objects.  Science also has beliefs, but to make it sound more important, scientists call those beliefs theories.  The scientific method attempts to prove that the theories are correct and to expand the understanding and details of those theories.

Science cannot prove strictly personal items.  It is not possible to weigh love, measure directly satisfaction, or count hate.  It is not even possible to directly analyze pain.  Scientists try to measure these strictly personal objects, but everything science does with these items is indirect.  For example, a doctor may ask you your pain level on a scale of 1 to 10, but that is a subjective measure and not an objective measure.  It is impossible for the doctor to measure directly your pain level.  The doctor cannot get a scale out and weigh your pain.  Even brain scans and EEG measurements do not measure pain they just measure physiological response to nerve stimulation.  Your awareness of pain is greater and more personal than the physiological response.

Consider, for example, love.  I know that I love my wife, son, step children, grandchild, dog, cats, and so on.  I cannot prove that love, except by my actions and that is just indirect.  No one could take out a ruler and measure my love.  Science cannot apply the scientific method to my love in such a way that others could know definitively my love.  Love is completely and utterly personal.

It is impossible for one person to know directly what another person feels.  Even if we could hook two people’s brains together, they still could not know each other’s feelings because our emotions, our response to external stimulations, our core being is determined by every experience we have had up to that point.  Since no two people follow the same path in life, no two people experience emotions the same way.  This puts love in the belief column.  Although I KNOW I love my family, I cannot prove it.  So ultimately, I can only say I believe in my love.

Others may believe that I do, in fact, love my family.  Others experience love themselves, and even though they do not have the same feelings towards my family as I do, they understand that those feelings exist.  Sometimes people may not understand why that particular feeling exists (“how is possible that people actually loved Hitler”), but they understand that there is such feelings.

What about stuff that many people may not experience directly?  What about, for example, spiritual experiences that many people may never encounter.  If something like love cannot be quantized or measured and therefore are not subject to the scientific method, something like spiritual experiences are even further removed from science.  If we cannot prove our love to another, when that other person also experiences love, how can we prove spirituality and religious belief to someone who has never undergone that experience?  It is at this point that ridicule and disbelief occur.

If a person cannot understand directly a spiritual belief of another and has no indirect proof, then that person is faced with a problem.  If the unbeliever (atheist) accepts that the other has had a spiritual experience, then that means the atheist is deficient in some manner.  Unless the atheist wants to admit this deficiency (which is rare) they then have to take the second path – trying to prove the other person’s beliefs are false.  Yet, spiritual experiences are not something you can measure.  It is not possible for the atheist to get out a scale and say “see your belief does not measure up!”  The attack on spiritual and religious knowledge must take different approaches.

One approach is the strawman approach.  In this approach, the atheist constructs a strawman; that is, they liken the religious belief to some other, more tangible belief, and then attack the strawman.  For example, someone could say that the belief in God is like the belief in Santa Claus.  Since we all know Santa Claus does not exist, it is obvious that God does not exist.  This argument fails on many dimensions.

Santa Claus is a belief children develop because they accepted their parents and adults as an authority on the subject.  The adults lied to the children (we hide that fact by calling it a fantasy or a story, but it is still a lie).  The children have no other source, so they accept the adult’s authority.  They believe in the existence of Santa Claus on authority of the lying adults.  Once the children grow old enough to perform an independent validation, they uncover the lie.  Their belief changes because they have new facts and data.

An atheist saying that belief in God is like a belief in Santa Claus is actually saying that belief in God is like a belief in a lie that some authority told you.  This may hold for children and extremely gullible people, but it does not hold for discerning, open minded adults who have directly experienced God.  In addition, the believer has additional proof of God that the believer in Santa Claus does not have.  There are corroborating historical documents that validate some of the religious writings.  There is the fact that millions of people have died for their belief – something that has not happened over the belief in Santa Claus.  More importantly, the belief in God is open to everyone, and everyone can run the religious experiment.  That is, each person has the opportunity to follow the authoritative sources on God and see the results for themselves.

The other approach an atheist can try to discredit a religious belief is to claim that science has never proved God exists and they only believe in science.  Before I get into what science can and cannot prove I have to address this belief in science.  Science has brought a lot of knowledge and understanding to the world.  Science has enabled a lot of engineering and technology that brings enhanced medicines, labor saving devices, and so on.  (It also enhanced war, pollution, oppression, and other ills, but we don’t need to go there for our current discussion.)  So, saying you believe in science seems reasonable.  The problem is most people have no idea what they are talking about or what they believe in when they say they believe in science.

First off, almost everything we call science these days is actually engineering.  Computers, cell phones, air planes, medicines, surgical procedures, cars, TVs, and on and on are all engineering feats.  For the most part, the science on these things is done behind closed doors and people never see the actual science.  Most people wouldn’t even know the scientific method if it hit them in the face.  So, what people are really saying when they say they believe in science is that they believe in the technology they have and they believe the authoritative sources that they are exposed to who proclaim the greatness of science.

Let’s look at those authoritative sources.  In most countries a major part of scientific research is funded by the government.  Research gets published in journals, but most people have never even seen a scientific journal, let alone read one.  Even though scientists publish, the publication is controlled by a review from scientific peers.  The government controls what scientists investigate through funding, and therefore control what scientists understand and believe.  I will point out that the government is controlled by politicians and bureaucrats not scientists or even people with a scientific background.

People’s exposure to science first comes about in school.  The classes are taught by the teachers, who are managed by administrators, and the whole thing is controlled and regulated by the government.  A lot or research and enhanced scientific advances come from universities.  Universities get a major part of their funding either directly (through grants) or indirectly (through tuition) that is paid by the government.  Other sources of scientific information and “discovery” comes from governmental agencies like NASA, national science foundation, food and drug administration, US department of agriculture, the atomic energy commission and its various follow on agencies, the department of defense, environmental protection agency, national weather service, US geological survey, and on and on.

Some people are exposed to science through things like public television.  Public TV gets a majority of their funding from the government.  If you perform a review of a lot of “scientific” articles on public media you will find that a lot comes from some governmental source (like NASA). Non-governmental entities, like the Discovery Channel may present “scientific documentaries” but these are often sensationalized stories.  Interestingly enough, many of the critics of these documentaries are government funded agencies and government supported public media.

So, when a person says they believe in science, they are really saying that they believe in the government.  The government is controlled and run by politicians, and we all know that politicians lie, cheat, twist the truth, hide information, and do whatever they can to remain in power.  Since most people have no direct experience with science, then when an atheist says they believe in science what they are saying is that their belief is just like the belief in Santa Claus – it’s based on a lie.

As I have shown, science cannot prove or disprove love.  Science cannot measure anything that is personal.  Scientists cannot measure thoughts, feelings, ideas, responses, or any of thousands of deeply personal experiences.  Yet, we all know these are real.  Science cannot answer basic questions like why does the universe exist or what is the meaning of life?  While modern science has discovered a huge amount about the physical reality, there is way more to our existence than just the physical.

Science (as people define science, which are the physical and social sciences) cannot, and never will, be able to scientifically prove personal, internal experiences of people.  Science is limited.  So, when an atheist says they only believe in science, they are also saying that they do not believe in emotions, thoughts, ideals, creativity, art, spirituality, honor, or God.  That’s kind of a limited point of view.

When I say I believe in God, I am not saying that I believe that someone once told me God exists and I accept their authority on the subject.  I say I believe because I have personal knowledge that I have tested using the scientific method.  I have investigated life with and without God.  I have researched God, the authoritative writings, and talked with people who I feel are experts on the subject (both for and against).  I have weighed all of the evidence and data and I have found that the evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of believing that God exists.

I cannot prove God’s existence.  I cannot pull out a photograph of God or take out my telescope and show you God.  However, I have looked deep inside myself and have found God there, waiting for me.  I cannot force you to believe.  I can only say that if you run the experiment – that is, if you follow the teachings of an authoritative source on religion and God, then you too may experience God in a way similar to (but not exactly the same as) my experience.

I hope you do.  I hope that you run the experiment and prove to yourself the existence of God.  However, if you instead try to hide behind science and use science as a shield, you will find that the shield is very small indeed and not much protection against larger truths.

The Cruel Joke of Atheism

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism

The Cruel Joke of Atheism

Atheists fiercely argue with theists about the existence of God. But why? Is it simply to win an argument to justify themselves intellectually, or is it out of love for the theist, believing that the theist would be happier as an atheist? In order to have any of these motives they would have to make a moral judgment on the value of religion and religious people. The problem is that in doing this they are doing the exact thing that they criticize religion for, i.e., making moral judgments of what is good or bad. I believe there is a story in antiquity about people who wanted to usurp the right of the deity to determine good and evil and become the judges, assuming the role of God.

Let’s talk about the happiness hypothesis first. Drawing from my personal experience, which I admit is limited, I have a number of friends who are atheists, and I do not think of them as especially happy people. From reading blogs written by atheist on the Internet, I would not personally judge those people as happy people. Some seem to be hinting at their emptiness and unhappiness in their compulsive blogging and criticism of religion.

The only real study I have found on happiness is Jonathan Haidt’s book, The Happiness Hypothesis, in which he clearly points out that believers are overall happier than unbelievers. By the way, Jonathan is an atheist. He claims that his book is based on scientific research. So the idea that atheists are spreading happiness is nothing more than a cruel joke. Of course, the atheist must believe the allusion that atheism is the salvation of the world and that materialism is the new gospel (good news). Is it really good news that we are just sacks of star-dust with a bio-chemical illusion maker, which we call a brain, telling us what to believe and leading us from nothingness to nothingness? According to the atheist, this is good news giving us all kinds of meaning and purpose. Is it good news or a bad joke?

Other atheists say they do not believe in God and speak out against faith because they believe it is not true or in some cases they say that it is evil. However, what do they mean by truth and evil? How can they condemn anything as evil? It seems the reality would be that it would be very hard to believe in the traditional meaning of truth or evil if there is no final and ultimate authority that stands above man. Is there is no authority outside of man as to what would make a thing right or wrong? Reason? The next question would be whose reason? Who determines whose reason is correct? Of course, the atheist believes in reasoning done by atheists, for they are the only reasonable people. Of course, in the end under their thinking it will be the reasoning of the guy who has the gun (power), which in the end means the state. Who do you think determines right and wrong in atheistic China or Russia? In atheistic cultures religion is not just wrong, it is bad and those who practice it are put into prison. Who determined that morality? Reason or the state?

Atheists, in order to prove their world view, must be able to establish by science that there is no God and that science can establish morality. However, they can do neither. All they can do is assert that there is no God on their own authority. Fortunately, in this country they don’t have the guns (power) as they did in communist Russia. Their problems with science proving that there is no God is huge, for anyone who knows anything about science knows that science cannot prove the existence of God or disprove it. The US National Academy of Sciences has gone on record with the following statement: “Science is a way of knowing about the natural world. It is limited to explaining the natural world through natural causes. Science can say nothing about the supernatural. Whether God exists or not is a question about which science is neutral.”[1] So much for their appeal to science. So, what about their appeal to science for their proof of atheism? Reality or a bad joke?

When it comes to morality, only someone desperate for an argument would infer that science should or could create morality. Morality is a subject of philosophy and metaphysics, not science. It seems to me that when talking to atheists about morality they don’t like,[2] they quickly become moral relativist and dismiss it.[3] However, when it comes to the morality they use to make judgments against religion, they are absolutists. Another one of their cruel jokes.

In reality they want us just to accept their opinion because it is their opinion and their opinion is based on an assumed world view of naturalism,[4] which they assume is reality. In this assumed reality, their arguments win by default and become the absolute.[5] Yet, if they are consistent with their world view, their beliefs are nothing more than a chemical reaction in the brain and are not real, especially if one of those beliefs is faith in a God. Of course, faith in reason is not a belief according to them, but reality and this reality proves their position that all beliefs in a God are an illusion. Of course, reason is real even though you cannot see it, taste it, smell it, or feel it. It seems to me, reason is a concept or belief like the idea of God. However, for the atheist God is an illusion and reason is real.[6] What a joke.

Still another cruel joke is that atheists are never consistent in the area of morality, nor are they fair or accurate in many of their moral judgments. For instance, they lump all religious groups and faith groups together and make sweeping generalities. An example is one made by one of their leaders in Religion Poisons Everything.[7] Of course, the first problem with this statement to a thinking person is: What is religion? The next question will be: Is there more than one, and if so, which one are you talking about or are you talking about all of them? What happens if you define religion as the practice of virtue? Would the practice of virtue poison everything? If a person’s religion was to love his fellow-man as himself, does that religion poison everything? Only if you subvert the religion and turned love into hate would that be true. However, if you subvert the religion, it is no longer that religion but another form of religion. The other form may poison everything but the original may be good. Another cruel joke of atheism is that it must deny this common sense truth that there is good and bad religion.

Their absolutist concrete mentality proves them to be very much like the religious people they judge as judgmental. Of course, as I have said elsewhere, they are the mere image of a fundamentalist religious person. This is nothing but a cruel joke, but this time the joke is on them.

[1]  Taken from Who made God?: A Searching for a Theory of Everything by Fay Weldon.

[2] Leftist of all kinds especially dislike morality which places limits on their sexuality; for example sexual preference, abortion, euthanasia, etc.

[3] Morality that restricts so-called sexual freedoms.

[4] Naturalism is an ideology that believes that nature is all that exists or is the whole show.

[5] Proof of this is the lack of references to any authority other than themselves in their articles on their blogs. All they have is their opinion or the talking points they get from other blogs, on which they feed their opinions.

[6] The problem is that if reason is real, free will must be real, but according to many atheists like Sam Harris, free will is an illusion.

[7] God is not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything by Hitchens.

The Roots of The New Atheist Movement

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism

The Roots of The New Atheist Movement

Where did the new atheist movement originate?  I may not have all the answers to this question but one thing I do know is that you cannot start and organize a movement around a non-belief as some of the new atheists would have people believe. To create a movement, you must have specific beliefs and the emotions that will fuel the movement. The energy of any movement comes from the emotions that drive it. Likewise, every movement is a bearer of particular beliefs and the emotions that are generated by the beliefs as they are put forth by forceful leaders of that movement. So, whatever is driving the new atheist movement is also spreading it. But what is it?

The belief that is driving the new movement is naturalism[1]. Naturalism is a belief system that believes nature is the whole show, and  there is nothing outside of it. Therefore atheists believe that everything must be explained by natural causes. In pure naturalism[2], there is no room for faith in a God or even the belief there might be something more than nature. The truthfulness of naturalism is not a question that science can answer. Therefore it falls into the area of metaphysics and is a question for philosophers and theologians[3].

What about the emotions driving this new movement? This writer believes that much of the new atheist movement has come out of a well of anger and hatred. It reflects the nihilism of the French and Russian Revolution. The movement exists for the main purpose of organizing atheists’ hatred of religion, good or bad. Of course, to the new atheist there is no such thing as good religion; there is only religion and it is bad. One of the marked differences between the new atheists and those of the French and Russian Revolutions comes in understanding the real reason for their anger. During the period that these Revolutions took place, the Catholic and orthodox churches had sided with the rich and were oppressing the poor, i.e., the poor had a reason to be angry. However, the new atheist seems to be made up of white, middle-class, college educated males who are part of the system that suppresses the poor. So, what are they angry about? Could it be that they are angry about a meaningless existence, which they have inherited from their secular education? An education that promised them utopia and that is failing.

Furthermore, it is not beyond belief to see the hand of the Communist Party of America behind a lot of the funding of the new atheist movement. The hard-core socialists still see religion, especially the Christian religion, as their chief enemy and would like to eradicate it around the world. You really need atheists in order to have communism and socialism because you need a people who believe in so-called scientific planning and who have the state as their ultimate concern. That is their benefactor and Savior. Of course, planning by the few, spells non-freedom for the many, for in the end there can only be one planner.

Another reason for this movement and many other deconstructionist movements[4] is rooted deep in our culture, a mega culture in which men have lost their identity and meaning. The old atheist types were not organized, because they had an identity and a strong belief in Western ideology and values. However, in recent decades Western academia has emptied these ideologies and values of any meaning. This has led to an increasing number of people in our culture empty of meaning and purpose. These people are easily attracted to movements, which give their existence meaning and structure. Hollowed out people are easy prey for any ideology and cultic belief. These movements are the devil’s workshop and the people who get involved are, as Lenin called them, “useful idiots” for cult leaders and dictators.

The only practical reason I can see for the new atheist movement is that it has afforded a number of shrewd men the opportunity to get wealthy and gain status in the eyes of their followers, which strangely is one of the things they charge religion with. Of course, when there is money and power to be had, there will always be men willing to spread hate to obtain it, men like Karl Marx and Stalin. Some new atheists will respond that they are not spreading hate or hurting anyone. I will grant you that if you steal a man’s faith that he doesn’t  value or have a need for; you have done little harm or hurt. However, if you destroy a person’s faith that has a weak faith, but needs it, you have done harm. Even some of the new atheists who have told their story of losing their faith, talk about the hurt and the negative emotions they experienced. Like many atheists, the new atheists have hardened their hearts to the pain of others and begin to think of their movement as a bitter pill that will cure people of the disease that is hurting them. That is, faith in God. Like all mass movements of true believers, they believe the end justifies the means.

However, are the new atheists really Angels of light as they claim, delivering a bitter pill or are they really Angels of darkness? I will let one of the old atheist types answer that question. An honest unbeliever, Dr. E. Wengraf, once confessed, “Every piece of anti-religious propaganda seems to me a crime.  I surely do not wish it to be prosecuted as a crime, but I consider it immoral and loathsome.  This is not because of zeal for my convictions, but because of the simple knowledge acquired through long experience, that, given the same circumstances, a religious man is happier than the irreligious.  In my indifference and skeptical attitude toward all positive faith, I have often envied other men to whom deep religiosity has given a strong support in all the storms of life.  To uproot the souls of such men is an abject deed.  I abhor any proselytizing.  But, still, I can understand why one who believes firmly in a saving faith tries to convert others.  But I cannot understand propaganda of unbelief.  We do not have the right to take away from a person his protecting shelter, be it even a shabby hut, if we are not sure, we can offer him a better, more beautiful house.  But to lure men from the inherited home of their souls, to make them err afterward in the wilderness of hypotheses and philosophical question marks, is either criminal fatalisms or criminal mindlessness.” Need I say more?

[1] Atheism in itself is not a belief. However, the naturalistic and the materialistic philosophy that support it are ideologies and represent worldviews. The minute an atheist starts arguing for his non-belief he has embraced a belief system of naturalism and materialism and the burden of proof shifts to them.

[2] In naturalist world view one could believe in a god, which existed inside nature and had evolved with the universe.

[3]  Werner Heisenberg physicist and Nobel prize winner for physics confirms  this, “If anyone wants to argue from the indubitable fact that the world exists to a cause of this existence, then this assumption does not contradict our scientific knowledge at a single point.  Scientists do not have a single argument or fact with which they would contradict such an assumption, even if it was about a cause which–how could it be otherwise– would evidently have to be sought outside our three-dimensional world” Wermer Heisenberg quoted by Hans Kung Pages 79-80 in “The beginning of All Things: Science and Religion”.

[4] Deconstructionist movements would include the radical gay rights movement, radical feminists, and radical socialism. All of these movements question the traditional moral and family structure of Western culture.

Spaghetti monsters, Unicorns, and God?

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism

Spaghetti monsters, Unicorns, and God?

Spaghetti monsters, unicorns, and hobgoblins. If you have ever talked to an atheist I’m sure you’re familiar with some of these fictional creatures that they compare belief in, to a belief in God. They say a belief is just a belief and cannot be proven or disproven unless you have tangible proof. But is this true or is it just some mumble jumble from someone wishing to win an argument?

Atheists say they do not believe in beliefs, but is that true? The truth is they believe in some beliefs and not in others. For example, they cannot see, touch, smell or hear their great, great, great, great grandparents however; they believe that they existed based on the fact that they themselves exist. This is  an inference based on causality; the existence of something that is seen now; can prove that something else (which cannot be seen) did or does exist. The causal inference is based on the law of cause and effect; we can infer some things by experiencing the existence of other things.

If we observe an effect, we know that there must be something equal to or greater than the effect and that cause cannot be just a belief, for beliefs without a corresponding reality can do nothing. The idea of a gun cannot shoot you, nor can an idea of a dog bite you. Yet there is something, so there had to be something to create it, not just an idea or belief. God is not just a belief. Therefore, the law of causality places the belief in God in a completely different order of beliefs than spaghetti monsters and unicorns which have no causality factor. Unless you give spaghetti monsters and unicorns causality power; i.e. the characteristics of God that is, all powerful, all knowing and eternal. Of course, if you did that you would simply be changing the name of God.

Atheists say they don’t believe in beliefs however they themselves believe the most unbelievable things that can be imagined, i.e. they believe that something came from nothing. People who believe that something could come from nothing; could also possibly believe in spaghetti monsters and unicorns. Those who believe in the law of cause and effect cannot believe such nonsense.  Do you know why they believe that something came from nothing? Because one atheistic scientist wrote a book claiming it happened.[1] If this is the kind of faith and gullibility required to be an atheist, then I don’t have enough faith to be an atheist.

Subsequently, there are hundreds, perhaps thousands or tens of thousands of atheistic scientists and atheists who believe in a multi-verse of 11 dimensions without having one bit of objective evidence to support it. Are these people irrational? What about the atheist that believes in alien life forms? The truth is those atheists believe in all kinds of things that they’re not allergic to. I bet some of them believed in Santa Claus until someone told them that his real name was Saint Nick

I wonder if they believe that in one of those fairytale universes, that there might be flying spaghetti monsters and unicorns. If you can believe in fairytale universes, couldn’t you also believe in the magical creatures that populate those universes?

In reality atheists just want us to accept their opinion (beliefs) as concrete fact, even if they are nonsense. They have no facts; all they have is suppositions and assertions. They fail to see that their belief in materialism and naturalism is no different in kind from other people’s belief in God; the different is their opinions (beliefs) have not fulfilled the law of cause and effect[2]. Therefore, their beliefs in materialism and naturalism are equal to believing in spaghetti monsters and unicorns[3]. Moreover, if they are consistent with their world view (none are) their beliefs are nothing more than a chemical reaction in the brain, which are determined by the law of cause and effect; a principle that they only believe in when it’s convenient and advantageous for their own arguments.

Consider for example, the beliefs of love and reason. You cannot see, touch, hear or taste love. Yet, most normal people and some atheists believe it is real, however, it is a belief that you cannot put under a microscope, so does that make it just an illusion or just a belief?  What about reason itself.  Is it real or just a belief?  There are some atheistic scientists like Sam Harris[4] who do not believe that love, reason or free will, really exist. He believes that they’re just beliefs or allusions. He says that we are just “biochemical puppets”. Yet, reason has taken him and others to the place that they can deny reason.

How do they know they’re right if they can’t trust reason? If atheists believe that we are biochemical puppets or soft machines why do they spend so much time arguing about their beliefs or lack of them? Are they simply programmed to be contentious and contrary? No, the truth is that their ideologies of materialism and naturalism have taken them into fallacious thinking, which has led them into denying the simplest truths of reality. This reminds me of the words of Aristotle. “For as bats’ eyes are to daylight so is our intellectual eye to those truths which are, in their own nature, the most obvious of all.”

 

[1] These atheistic scientists are brilliant men and they know that the law of cause and effect is devastating to their atheism. The idea that something came from nothing was created for the sole reason to skirt the law of cause and effect. Since the time of the big bang theory which basically says that the earth and the universe had a beginning some atheistic scientists have been trying to explain away the law of cause and effect and that the universe had a beginning. Their efforts have led to the nonsense of some claiming that there are multiverse’s and that something can come from nothing.

[2] Materialism and naturalism both have to believe that everything is eternal without begin or end and void of first cause or a prime mover. The only other explanation is that some came out of nothing spontaneously, again no first cause. Both of these ideas seem to contradict the consensus of science that the universe began in what is known as the big bang and deny the law of cause and effect.

[3] Believers have no problem meeting the demands of the law of cause and effect because they start with an uncreated consciousness which is the cause of all things. Spaghetti monsters and unicorns fit in the category of beliefs like, something coming from nothing, which s the spaghetti monster of atheism.

[4] Sam Harris is one of the guru’s of the new atheists’ movement.

Searching For God

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism, Science

Searching For God

“The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands.  And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.  From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, We are his offspring.’  “Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone-an image made by man’s design and skill. In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. Acts 17:24-30

In mans search for God, one of the big questions is, where do we start? Traditionally we start with God and our discussion would center on God or religion. But is God really where we should begin? Wouldn’t it  be more logical to look at the material which we know best? And is not that material, humanity?

If we start with God, we end up judging God by human standards and man’s reasoning, as though we ourselves were gods or as though we believe we have enough knowledge to make a sound judgment of Him. In this, we are saying that God’s existence depends on him  yielding to our criteria. Therefore, the biggest problem by starting with God is that as soon as we put him on trial, we have implied a number of  assumptions. We have assumed that we have the right to judge the creator, which infers that we have the authority, power and knowledge to do so.  We also assume that our reasoning is accurate enough to make a judgment on God. However, when human reason is put on trial, we will likely find her to be a sick lady; sick with finiteness and sin. So, what does she have to say of God that cannot be questioned?

Then again, if we start with man, there are two hypotheses that we can begin with. The first one is;  man is a creature that is purely an accident and the result of natural causes. Who over time has evolved into the creature that we know today. Then there is the theistic hypothesis; that man was somehow created by a deity, then something happened to the experiment and it went awry.

In this article, we are going to assume that the Christian or God hypothesis is correct, which would mean that man was created by a deity and something went awry. In tradition theology this is referred to as the fall of man. If this hypothesis is true, our attention should turn away from judging God, to cross-examining and judging mankind. In this view, humanity should be put on trial and be held accountable for its beliefs and its unbelief.

Now, if the Christian hypothesis is true, what should we expect to see? To begin with we should expect to see a creation (beginning) of all things, including man.  It also seems logical to think that we should see in a humanity created by God, an  intimate awareness of God, which would include a universal knowledge to some degree of good and evil.  It would mean that man as the image bearer of God would have a consciousness that was capable of choosing good or evil. It would also entail God creating a universe that is orderly and predictable based on laws, which a finite being like man could trust, in conducting and ordering his life.

Let us start with the latter quality, the habitat of man must be orderly, predictable and based on law in order for man to survive. When we look at the earth and universe that is exactly what we find. Now, if there were no God and the earth was an accident would we expect to find order or would we expect to find chaos?  However, when we look at the universe we do not find chaos or disorder. We find the laws of nature, which are immutable, giving man a perfect habitat to live in. These laws infer a law giver. The law and order of the universe is exactly what one would expect to find if a consciousness had created the universe.  It is this law and order in the universe that allows us to do science or philosophy. Without the consistency of the laws of nature reason would not work.

What about the hypothesis that mankind has an innate awareness of God? To begin with the Christian hypothesis proclaims beyond question that mankind as a whole has been given an awareness of the uncreated God. The apostle Paul says, “For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse; for although they knew God they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their senseless minds were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man or birds or animals or reptiles” (Rom 1:19-23). The text infers that when men rejected this revelation of God’s existence that their reasoning and behavior become corrupted. The scripture does not reveal how their reasoning was corrupted, nor to what extent, it simply says that it happens when men reject God. However, it does seem that the text is pointing more to a corporate occurrence, rather than an individual one.

Is there secular evidence to support a universal revelation or consciousness of a higher power or cosmic order?  In actuality there is, however without any evidence it seems to be a self-evident truth that mankind in general is homo-religious, i.e. by his very nature he seems to be religious[1].  Religion is simply an outward symbol of a belief or an awareness of something that transcends this dimension[2]. The universal presence of religion is  strong evidence that God has revealed himself to all men, and that mankind has often neglected, rejected it or corrupted it. The scripture says, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt. They do abominable deeds, there is none that does good.” (Psalms 14:1) In this passage the writer put everyone who does wicked deeds in the category of being an atheist.

In biblical times being an atheist had more to do with behavior than beliefs. Very few would have denied the existence of God or the gods in the ancient world. Modern atheism arose out of modern mans rebellion against the catholic Church and it misuse of power. It took its organized form in humanism and later in liberalism. Both philosophies are centered in rejecting any authority of man or God. The roots go deep into anarchy and rebellion against authority.

In addition, there is also a study done by Oxford University Psychologist Dr. Olivera Petrovich,  who demonstrates that children around the world are hardwired to believe in God as creator.  One of her conclusions is that “Atheism is definitely an acquired position.” Petrovich research is keeping with Steven Pinker’s study of human nature, in which he confirms that human beings are not born as a blank slate, but rather are hard wired in a number of ways[3].

Closely connected with an innate awareness of God, we should expect an innate sense of right and wrong if God created everything. What’s more, when we turn to the world that is exactly what we find. We find a sense of right and wrong everywhere. Of course, the naturalist will argue that morality is a creation of human reason and evolved over time.  However, in saying this they cannot produce one bit of evidence to prove their hypothesis, for they were not there to witness it.

What we have to work with today is our own experience that morality is universal and does not depend on reason alone.  Remember that Germany under the Nazis was the most intellectual culture of its day and yet it was the most barbaric.  Reason in itself does not lead to morality.   Reason needs a cornerstone from which it may lay its foundation on, to be able to reason from.

Our hypothesis infers that we should be able to pin point a beginning, or a creation where God made all things, including man in his image[4]. Well, when we turn to science it tells us that the universe had a beginning.  Scientists referred to this beginning as the ‘big bang’. The big-bang theory actually postulates that the universe came into existence out of nothing and this is exactly what you would expect if God created the heavens and earth as Genesis 1:1 teaches.  Prior to the Big-Bang theory, science taught us that the universe was steady and fixed i.e. eternal without beginning or end.

I admit that the above does not prove the existence of God, but it does show that the world in which we live is the kind of world, which we would expect to find if there was a God.

 

[1] Talcott Parsons, served on the faculty of Harvard University from 1927 to 1973. says “The view that belief in the supernatural is universal has been completely confirmed by modern anthropology. Religion is as much a human universal as language or an incest taboo, which is to say a kinship system. Any conception of ‘natural man’ who is not encumbered by such ‘cultural baggage’ belongs to fictional picture of prehistory, for which there is no solid evidence for the human, socially organized stage. The view that such ‘baggage’ ought to be dispensed with and that rational man should ‘face reality’ without any ‘superstition’ is a product of sophisticated culture, in no way true of the original human condition. Quoted in “An Interpretation of Religion by John Hick, page 21.

[2] William James speaks of this experience in his book “Varieties of Religious Experience, a Study in Human Nature”.

[3] The Blank Slate, The Modern Denial of Human Nature, by Steven Pinker.

[4] Here for are study, it does not matter how he did it, fast or slow.

Letter to a Young Atheist, a Leap of Faith

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics, Atheism, Faith

 Letter to a Young Atheist, a Leap of Faith

 You can doubt everything and everyone. You can even make a scientific argment that we do not exist and everything is an illusion (The Matrix). Sometimes, to believe in God we must first believe in people or at least a person. In some matters, we must trust the word and the experience of others. We all need to remember that our knowledge and experiences are finite; we personally cannot know and experience everything. Because we have not found or experienced something does not mean that, it does not exist; it simply means that I have not experienced it. I personally believe in many things that I have not experienced. I believe in them because I trust that someone else has experienced them and I trust that person’s word or testimony. The big question is whom can we trust and who should we listen to. After surveying a huge number of men living now and throughout history, I believe that Jesus can be trusted. In fact, I have trusted him with my life and eternity. However, it is not just Jesus; the greatest and most loving men I know are followers of Jesus Christ or had great respect for him and his teachings.

The following is a short article I wrote about faith, in the story Jesus is the old man. “In many cases, faith is the most reasonable thing you can embrace.  Let’s say that you were climbing a large mountain and it grew dark.  Now suppose that because of the difficulty of the climb, it would be impossible to retreat off the peak at night.  The problem worsens when you learn from your radio that a storm is coming, which would make the conditions hopeless to survive the night.  As you huddle on the mountain waiting for death, you remember a story told by an old man in the camp the week before.  He had mentioned that there was a hidden outcropping of rocks, which forms a small ledge just below the summit and off the ledge was a small cave that one could go into to escape the weather.  He said it was marked by a small pile of rocks just a short distance below the summit.  However, to reach it you must jump down about ten feet to the outcropping below, which is a large first step.  Now here is the problem.  It is pitch dark, and you have found the marker, but you cannot see the ledge below because it is so dark.  The jump requires a leap of faith-based upon the testimony of the old man.”

In view of the conditions, is the leap reasonable or is more rational to be pessimistic and doubtful, and do nothing?  Would it be logical not to make a choice?  It seems that to both the pessimist (atheist) and the indecisive (agnostic), a leap of faith is not the reasonable thing to do.  Both would have to choose to die on the mountain.  In this case, not to choose is to choose.  It is to choose death over the possibility of life.  What I am saying is that in some circumstances, the reasonable thing to do is to act on faith.  Sometimes reason tells us that it is not time to use reason.  In some cases, moving forward in faith is the most reasonable thing you can do.

Once the disciples of Jesus were listening to the Master, and when they turned around the crowd was walking away murmuring that they just could not believe what the Teacher was saying.  When the Teacher saw the despair on the faces of the disciples, He asked them, “Are you going to leave too?”

Their answer was their leap of faith in the midst of despair.  “Where shall we go?  You have the words of eternal life.”

Who Has The Burden of Proof Atheists or believers?

Posted on by Lyle Duell in Apologetics

The Burden of Proof

I have read a number of articles written by atheists, claiming that the burden of proof about the existence of God lies on the believer. That is believers have the responsibility of  proving the existing of a God. That may be true if the belief in God was a new doctrine that had not been accepted by billions. But, belief in a God is still the predominant world view in the west with atheism being held by a minority.  When a minority says the majority is incorrect, it seems this would shift the burden proof on those making the charge that the majority is wrong. Was the burden of proof in atheistic Russia and China placed on the atheists because unbelief was the acceptable ideology?

When the first Christian missionaries went into the non-Christian world, they seemed to accept that the burden of truth was on them and not on the pagans. Paganism was the established faith and Christians understood that they must prove it false and offer something more to the people. Atheism has failed to do either.

I think the real reason for atheists trying to shift the burden of proof to believers is that they have no evidence or proof for God’s nonexistence. When a man has no evidence against something, he has few options. (1) He can completely ignore the subject and act, as though he is above it and refuse to engage in any debate. (2) He can listen to his opponent and try picking apart his arguments, without ever offering any evidence for his own position. In this, his augments are based and directed at attacking the man’s arguments and the subject is somewhat ignored. (3) He can cleverly build a straw man and change the subject. The later is a favorite of  atheists; they change the debate over the existence of God, to how religion is so bad and corrupt. The constant chatter of atheists about the burden of truth belonging to believers is nothing more than a diversion away from the existence of God debate, to the subject of religion, and this diversion is a clear indication that atheists have no evidence, only quibbles, assertions and suppositions.

I personally believe that faith in God is a positive affirmation, which to a believer is a self-evident truth. Self-evident truths need no evidence, they just are. Does a person have to prove scientifically that the sky is blue? If they did, they could not. The sky being blue is just a part of our human understanding at one level of awareness of reality, i.e. self-evident truth. A person does not have the responsibility or the burden of proof  to justify such beliefs, as though they were in a courtroom and the only evidence which was acceptable, is science. If so, you would need a courtroom to put common sense on trial to determine what constitutes common sense and is not common sense our collective reason? So, in the end reason itself must be put on trial and how would reason defends itself?

Moreover, science itself would have to be put on trial to prove what makes up true science and to prove that it has the ultimate authority to judge. There are many things that science will never have an answer to, like why was the universe created? Why is there something and not nothing? Why some things are the way they are and not some other way. Science alone can never be the final judge of reality. When it claims finality and that its knowledge is absolute, it ceases to be science and becomes something else.

What it comes down to it, if you question what the majority considers to be self-evident truth, you should be prepared to accept the burden of proof.  To expect otherwise is pure folly.