Best ways to discuss religion: logical arguments?

[Angrboda]

I studied some law in college, and what I found was that to think legally requires a different mindset and form of cognition than reasoning scientifically about facts. This is not to say that one is superior to the other, because obviously legal thinking serves useful ends in terms of justice, fairness, and equity. However, you're never going to translate one into the other, nor would it make sense to do so. I'm not here arguing that ultimately religious reasoning is as useful or valid as scientific or pragmatic reasoning. What I am pointing toward is that religious thinking exists in a web of meanings and epistemic procedures that you only partially share as a non-theist. In terms of competing scientific theories, Thomas Kuhn in his philosophy of scientific paradigms referred to this phenomena as "semantic incommensurability" — the meaning of terms in one theory cannot be cashed out in terms of the competing theory. (Newtonian gravity and Einsteinian gravity being good examples.) I would further make the point that beyond failing to take into account this semantic and epistemic gap in communicating, non-theists themselves are guilty of leaning on mythological realities themselves as well, contributing to their failing to recognize the gap, or appreciate its measure. (I'm not going to elaborate on this point other than to say that it dives deeply into psychology and cognitive science, the end result being, imho, that there are myths on both sides, although I would acknowledge that non-theist's illusions are likely considerably less egregious.) Another aspect of the problem can be viewed from the standpoint of epistemological holism and coherentist theories of truth (even if one discounts the main thrust of coherentism). Unfortunately I have no time to explore that aspect today.


I'm running behind, so later.

Regarding usefully interesting theist apologists, while I know most only by reputation, I would suggest Alvin Plantinga, Richard Swinburne and the Christian existentialist, Paul Tillich. (There's also a book by - I believe - Howard Sobel, on the "Logic Of Theism", but I hear it's awfully dense stuff, consisting of a lot of symbolic logic; probably only for a professional philosopher or theologian. If you have interest in the ontological arguments for the existence of God, I can recommend no better than Graham Oppy's book of similar title. The twin Impossibility/Improbability of God anthologies I'm told are good as well (Michael Martin, ed.)) (I have 'The Impossibility', but haven't read it yet.) I also find that the website AnswersinGenesis to have usually high quality material, and to a lesser extent, TrueOrigins (a play on words off of Talk Origins). Patrick Holding of Tektonics ministries, while not particular a high quality apologist, is hard to ignore based on seeming effectiveness, bombast, and following.

@LiberalHearted: I believe one would have to look at the Maccabees and beyond for the emergence of Satan as a Zoroastrian like demiurge or co-equal antagonist of God. Unfortunately, much of the source of Satanic mythology is extra-biblical, including Talmudic, Gnostic, and popular literature, as well as the Apocrypha mentioned. There is a fascinating exploration of the development of the Satan character through time from a BBC documentary on it. It's currently hosted on Youtube as Who Is Satan? (not the original title), starring comedian Andy Hamilton; if you're arguing about Satan, it's probably required background material. (By the way, loved your post on the fallacist's fallacy; great stuff)

Anyway, gtg.