Van Tillian/Clarkian Presuppositional Apologetics.

[Statler Waldorf]

Heaven will suck... You will have to carry on worshipping some unstable nut job, while we will be in hell absolutely wasted and fucking everything that moves.

If we are going to be talking about Biblical concepts like Heaven and Hell, let’s stick to actual biblical descriptions of them shall we? Hell does not sound nearly as fun as you described it here. Gnashing of teeth.

Amazing a YEC talking about logic.

Show/Tell me the logic behind YEC.

You guys always do this and it cracks me up. You use the word logic to mean something completely different than what it actually means. You are using it to mean something you believe to be true and anyone who does not hold that view is not using logic. Creationists hold to ultimate standards that are axiomatic. They then reason from these standards deductively to other conclusions. That is logical whether you agree with their conclusions or not.

In particle physics fundamental interactions or fundamental forces control how elementary particles interact with one another. The interactions of these elementary particles control the nature of matter and objects in the macroscopic universe.

I am with you so far….

The four fundamental non-contact forces are; electromagnetism, strong nuclear force, weak nuclear force and gravitation.

Still with you…

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All interactions between elementary particles are governed by some combination of these forces. Without going too deep into the physics; these interactions take certain forms based on the relative strength of these forces and the particles involved. It follows from this that the number of possible outcomes of any given interaction must be necessarily limited. Additionally while predicting which specific particle might be involved in a reaction is difficult for several reasons the actual interactions are not random and can, in fact, be expressed mathematically as can the probability of any one particle being involved.

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Still with you…

I would hold that these fundamental forces are intrinsic properties of our reality. If these forces behaved differently we would simply not exist as we do. Additionally, there is no reason to suppose that such universal forces would or indeed could suddenly cease to function or change their behaviours.

Well when you say, “we wouldn’t exist if they did change” you are essentially proving an irrelevant hypothesis. I agree with you, but that does not tell us anything about how you know they will continue into the future. Wouldn’t you also agree that you have no reason to assume they will continue into the future? If a flipped coin lands on heads three times in a row that does not give us anymore confidence it will land on heads rather than tails after the next flip right? However, if I had an infallible source telling me the coin will land on heads until the end of the age I have complete confidence in assuming this to be true right?

Indeed, the point was to highlight that induction as a logical tool would still be useful without 100% uniformity in nature. I raised this because you disagreed with my proposition that induction could still be used in such circumstances.

Oh I didn’t mean to say that if I did, I agree with your point here.

Okay, I think given the current understanding of Particle Physics, Big Bang Cosmology, General Relativity and numerous other extremely well evidenced theories we can suppose excellent grounds for this uniformity to exist. Some of which I have already tried to explain.

Sure we have excellent grounds for this uniformity to be present in the past after we have observed it, but to say we have excellent grounds to assume it will continue in the future is begging the question because it assumes past observed events will resemble future observed events.

Obviously I appreciate the philosophical challenge of induction in the justification of the scientific method. However, what you seem to be trying to do is to project this too far. I don’t need to be able to tell you why the fundamental forces are there, sufficient that they are there. Your argument seems to be of the form;

As of yet, we cannot explain why some property of the universe exists as it does therefore God must exist to make it that way?

I do not believe that is the form of the argument at all. I would say it is more like…
1. Christian believes A to be true; Christian has a reason to believe A to be true.
2. Secularist believes A to be true, secularist has no valid reason to believe A is true but asserts that the Christian’s valid reason is false.

Correct me if I’m wrong there. As for why don’t objects just pop into and out of existence etc ... I assume you were just using that as rhetoric. I’m sure you don’t need me to explain that to you or point out that you yourself allow for things to be conjured into existence as long as you call it an axiomatic presupposition?

Well it was not so much really rhetoric, if you assume the principle of induction to be valid then sure we don’t have to worry about my desk turning into a couch tomorrow morning. If I have no basis for induction (which the secularist has not provided one to date) then I have no proof that my desk will not morph into a couch tomorrow morning. I was wondering though when you were describing forces above, what are forces? Are they material? Immaterial? Abstract?
Well you too believe that matter just popped into existence at one point in time, you just believe it happened naturalistically, I believe it happen super-naturalistically.

Please don’t preach to me Statler. I appreciate your right to you own views and try to maintain a civilised and rational level of discussion with you and I don’t tell you that you should just accept my views, in return please do the same.

I would say one of the goals of a debate or discussion is to possibly convince the other person of your position right? So it was not preaching at all, but merely just a question.

I already said that ultimately the Uniformity in Nature is presupposed as constant in a naturalistic universe. I have then proceeded to demonstrate arguments which rationalise, justify and support this a posterior and therefore justify the use of the principle of induction as a method of gaining probabilistic knowledge.

However, in your justifications you have subtly assumed induction to be true because they all appeal to it in some form or another, so this is not really a justification right?

The result of your assumptions in this instance is no way an indication of their quality. I could just as easily say that I accept that reality is inherently uniform as an axiomatic assumption. This solves the problem of induction and is therefore a good assumption. When you make large assumptions that an entire belief system is correct it’s easy to craft it to solve any problem you want.

Well yes you could certainly do this, and I would even argue that you have. However, in logical reasoning the farther back and fewer in number your axiomatic assumptions are the better, so mine would be one more level back than yours. You would have to hold to around a half a dozen, one axiomatic assumption for each of the preconditions of knowledge, I have to hold to one, the triune God of scripture exists and everything else falls into place.

Are you suggesting then that God is in fact not omnipotent? That he could not cause these things without the Universe already providing for them? Hypothetically, is it not possible that God only maintains the bubble of space-time around our planet or solar system as uniform? That would satisfy your passage, no?

Well just because God chooses to do something a particular way it does not follow that He is somehow only limited to doing it that way. I do not know the particulars of how He governs His creation consistently and predictably because He did not reveal the details to us, I just know that He does do it and will do it until the end of the age.

The point is, the passage you provided does nothing to justify a Universal uniformity of nature, unless you can provide this justification for your presupposition it becomes arbitrary.

Not following you on this one. Some of the things in the verse are limited to earth (Harvest); some are indeed universal, such as heat and cold.

Okay. So you accept that miracles do in fact cause a problem for your argument? However, they’re quite rare and are sometimes achieved with natural means so you don’t have to worry too much.

Well I wouldn’t say they cause a problem, I think they just make induction what it is, highly probable but not completely certain.

I think your side-stepping the logical conclusion that whether you think he may or not God could alter how the universe works however I’d rather discuss something more substantive at the moment.

Sure He could, but He said He wouldn’t so it’s not a big issue. I am so glad you are back in these discussions, this sort of dialogue is always fun I think.