Official Debate -- KnockEmOutt and Jeffonthenet

[Shell B]

The question posed in this debate is "Is belief in God irrational?"

KnockEmOutt will be arguing that it is irrational, while Jeffonthenet will be arguing that it is not irrational.

I expect both members to have their opening arguments in within five days from this posting. These arguments should just generally cover each participant's stance on the issue and their arguments. Within five days of those being posted, each participant must form a rebuttal to the other's opening statement and so forth until they are satisfied. I expect one post each for each response and no jumping ahead. Each response must be answered in turn. If you have something to add, do so before the next round of rebuttals and do it by editing the post. If the other participant had already responded, you are out of luck.

Be sure to adhere to these rules. If there are any questions or problems with the rules, please contact a mod or admin. https://atheistforums.org/thread-976.html

As always, this thread is closed to anyone other than staff and the participants.

[KnockEmOuttt]

For the record, Jeffonthenet has clarified that we are debating about the God of Jesus Christ.

Belief in god as presented by the Bible and the Christian mythology is irrational. In fact, belief in God requires a rejection of rationality and an acceptance of blind faith in that for which there isn't one bit of evidence, as well as the outright rejection of that for which there is evidence. Questioning the tenets of the faith has been historically frowned upon (perhaps that is an understatement), as belief in the unproven and invisible are key requirements. Evidence and inquiry are not. There are more reasons to doubt this god than to take him as gospel truth, based on several points:

1. There is no evidence for the existence of this god.
2. The accounts of Jesus Christ's life and deeds are Biblical anecdotes written many years after they were claimed to have occurred, and their truth as historical record is questionable.
3. The Christian god is far smaller in concept than the universe he purportedly created.
4. There is evidence for things which contradict Biblical history (such as evolution and the Big Bang).

It is for these reasons that I take the position that there is simply no way belief in any god proposed by Christianity is rational. It is an abandonment of rational thinking and an adherence to an unsubstantiated allegation of the divine. While there are many arguments (ontological, moral, design etc.) and even threats (Pascal's wager) which attempt to appear rational and make a case for believing in God, they are merely based on claims, not evidence, and such a belief in that which is without evidence is certainly irrational.

[Jeffonthenet]

Hello everyone,

I wanted to thank everyone watching for taking their valuable time to discuss this important issue, and a special thanks to knockemoutt for participating. I especially hope that everyone reading this debate will use this opportunity to once again step back, and in the name of rationality, subject their own beliefs to questioning. One of my greatest fears in engaging in this dialogue would for us to be come a bit like the US political parties—Republicans and Democrats, who tend to focus on their side winning rather than on getting to the truth.

I would also like to clarify the question under debate tonight. The question is, “is belief in the God of Jesus Christ irrational?” The question is not, “does the God of Jesus Christ exist?” While both are important questions, I chose the former because I didn’t want this to become and endless discussion of my burden of proof as a theist or his possible burden of proof as an atheist. I will be defending the statement, “belief in the God of Jesus Christ is not irrational.” I believe this statement will be defended adequately if I can show that…

- There is no inconsistency between believing in the God of Jesus Christ and acting rationally in holding this belief.


- There is no successful argument against the God of Jesus Christ

Before I really get into the meat of my claims, I think it will be helpful to point out something else.

The God of Jesus Christ is not dependant upon biblical inerrancy

Biblical inerrancy is the belief that the bible is without error. Unfortunately, this belief is often confused with the truth of Christianity. I completely understand where you are coming from if you have rejected the God of Jesus Christ because you have found some error in the bible… as I did the same thing earlier in my life. However, it now seems to me that I had been sold a counterfeit religion, as a result of human sinfulness. Consider these propositions,

1. The God of Jesus Christ exists
2. The bible is without error

Certainly, looking at the propositions, it is not clearly irrational to believe 1 and 2. I suspect this point will come up later, so I will leave it for now…


But wouldn’t the God of Jesus Christ, if he existed, not allow difficulties with science such as one finds in the bible? Well, while this may be the first impression of most people, we often find that our first impression, what was taken for granted by those before us, is wrong. This has often happened in the scientific realm, where one finds that the correct scientific theory is highly counter-intuitive. Such is the case with Einstein’s theory of relativity. Likewise, it is with the Christian God. When one takes a closer look at the bible, one finds that it is claimed in its own pages that this God seems to intend His works to appear irrational. So my claim here is this: if Christianity is true, it is not unlikely that it will appear irrational. Since I am quite sure someone may immediately mistake what I am doing here as rejecting logic, I thought it would help to represent my claim in symbolic logic. (though I never learned how to symbolize probabilistic logic, so it is not the perfect representation of my claim which is in italics above)

- C ⊃ CAI – if C (Christianity) is true, it is not unlikely that Christianity will appear irrational (CAI)

The appearance of irrationality seems to me to be a false-positive for one who uses it as a reason to disbelieve, as it is not unlikely that the appearance of irrationality is exactly what one should expect if Christianity is true. Long before Darwin or even modern science, it seems to be claimed by the apostle Paul in the New Testament that Christianity is intended to appear irrational. He writes,

“…Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel—not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.’Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.” (1 Corinthians, 1:17-21, NIV—please note I am not using this letter of Paul from the New Testament as an authority on any topic except for what would be the case if Christianity is true)
But what about the claim that there is no evidence for the existence of God? I don’t believe this is the case, but even if it were true, I don’t think it would follow that it is irrational to believe in God. There is likewise no evidence for the reliability of our mind, as any evidence would presuppose that our mind is reliable (since we would perceive it through our mind). However, I do not grant you that there is no evidence for the existence of the God of Jesus Christ. Many people in the world claim experiences of this God, and it would be irrational to simply apriori (assume simply as an unjusitified assumption) say that these people could not possibly be rational in believing in God as their experiences must be false. Regardless of the rationality of non-believers, how does one know that these believers are not rationally trusting a true experience from God which they received? How does knockemoutt know that such people could not have experienced God? Especially since personal experience is by its very nature internal and not external, how can one discount this personal experience as it cannot be externally experienced?—it can only be internally experienced by the person having the experience.

It seems to me that what I have said throughout this post applies directly to knockemoutt’s list of claims, by as this is an opening statement, I wanted to put my claims in my own words before I replied much to his.

To summarize what has been said, and apply it to knockemoutt’s claims, I will simply quote him

“1. There is no evidence for the existence of this god.”

- In my reply I tried to show that even in the absence of evidence it doesn’t follow that we are irrational to believe something. However, I do not grant that there is an absence of evidence, but I defended the belief that the evidence is not sharable as it is personal experience. (it could also be personal intuition) Yet, for the sake of argument, I will grant that the Kalaam Cosmological Argument, the fine-tuning argument (from the initial conditions of the Big Bang), the moral argument (from the existence of objective moral values to God), and the Ressurection argument (from the historical evidence of Jesus to his ressurection), which seem to be defended fairly well in debates by William Lane Craig, are all nothing but foolishness and nonsense. I will grant for the sake of argument that they are entirely false and useless. However, for the reasons already mentioned, it doesn’t follow that one is irrational to believe in God just because one doesn’t have some argument for God.

“2. The accounts of Jesus Christ's life and deeds are Biblical anecdotes written many years after they were claimed to have occurred, and their truth as historical record is questionable.”

- In response to this, I would say two things. First, as I have defended earlier, (I refer you to those comments for a fuller explanation) this could be explained as the appearance of irrationality that one should expect if Christianity is true. Secondly, though many historians accept that there are discrepancies between different New Testament books, it doesn’t follow that they are not reliable accounts of Jesus any more than if one will find an error in the first-century historian Josephus, it will mean that he will no longer be trusted as an historian. Also, the claim that the written accounts of Jesus are found “many years” after he lived does not reconcile itself to the historical method, as the distance between the written accounts of what Jesus did and said, and his actual life are quite close by historical standards. Ignoring the fact that we have Paul’s epistle to the Galatians written about 51 A.D., the earliest gospel, Mark, is dated by most all scholars in the relevant fields to have been written from 60 to 80 A.D. That is only 27 to 47 years after Jesus lived, (many of those who saw Jesus preach were still alive) while many ancient sources we rely upon are written a century or more after the events that they purport to describe.

“3. The Christian god is far smaller in concept than the universe he purportedly created.”

I don’t understand how this is the case as you have left this point without explanation. I would appreciate a longer and more in-depth post in the future, as one of the points of a formal debate is to be a more in-depth discussion of the issues than a normal forum post.

“4. There is evidence for things which contradict Biblical history (such as evolution and the Big Bang).”

As I have defended in this post in much greater detail, Christianity, if it is true, is not unlikely to appear irrational. And if this is the case, the discrepancies between evolution and the big bang and some statements in the bible are consistent with Christianity being true. Likewise I have defended the view that errors in the bible do not preclude the God of Jesus Christ existing.

As I stated at the beginning of this post, I am defending the view that it is not irrational to believe in God, and that this view will be adequately defended if there is no inconsistency shown between believing in God and acting rationally in holding to that belief. I have argued for this by arguing that to disbelieve biblical inerrancy and still believe in the existence of the God of Jesus Christ need not be irrational. I have also defended this by arguing that rather than being evidence against the existence of the Christian God, it is not unlikely that the difficulties reconciling certain statements in the collection of books in the bible with science is what one should expect to happen if Christianity is true. I have also responded to each one of knockemoutt’s points.

Thank you,

- Jeff

[KnockEmOuttt]

So basically, the bible explains it all away by saying "and if none of it makes sense, that's because it's not supposed to." I don't see how that means it's rational to believe in the God of Jesus Christ, if anything it sounds more like an excuse for being irrational. Even then, your arguments there are on the basis that Christianity is true, which is a pretty big "if." Biblical errancy aside, using the bible to justify the contents of the bible is rather redundant if you're trying to be convincing (unless of course you're going to try to use the fear of Hell.)

I imagine you're referring to the Testimonium Flavianum as evidence for the existence of the historical Jesus. I could go on about how this may have been a forgery, but the main reason I discount much (and there is very little to begin with) of what Josephus had to say about Jesus is because he was born after Jesus' alleged death. He is not a primary source, and so chances are all of his references to Jesus are based on hearsay.

27 to 47 years may be short by the standards of history itself, but for an individual (and that's what we're talking about here; the lifetime of a man) that's plenty of time to more or less have their way with otherwise undocumented history. Of course, that's assuming the bible is a reliable historical record.

You ask how I could know that people could not have experienced God. To that, I will respond similarly; how can you know that they have? Many people in the world may very well claim experiences of this god, but how do we know for certain that it is indeed a divine experience and not something else? The church encourages the belief that these are in fact experiences of God, so naturally that's what adherents would believe. My assumption that these experiences are not divine is not an unjustified assumption, but a default position. I will assume a lack of existence or effect unless I have evidence to the contrary. A personal experience without any way to substantiate it cannot be submitted as evidence.

As for the conceptual size of God, I will explain.

Let's think for a moment about the size of religion compared to the populace. Judaism has been around for about 5,000 years. For the most part they don't take any converts, so it's mostly who's been born into the faith. Christianity has existed for just under 2,000 years. Even if we combine these Abrahamic faiths, it's still not a very large amount of people, given how many people it is we're talking about. As of 2012, Christians make up between 31-35% of the current world population of an estimated 7 billion, less than half of the world. If we consider the age of these religions compared to the age of the human race, about 100,000 years (using scientific data, not religious text), we find that this god has only existed for about 5% of mankind's existence. If we compare all of this to the total number of people estimated to ever have been born, we find that only about 1.75% (barring fluctuations in demographics; this number isn't perfectly accurate but it's a basic estimation, the real number is perhaps smaller) of people who have ever lived (estimated in 2011 to be 107,602,707,791) believe or believed in the God of Jesus Christ.

This, however, is not even the full picture. We must also take into consideration the other religions which have existed throughout human history. The classical faiths of the ancient Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians were polytheistic, and quite materialistic in comparison to other faiths; their beliefs in no way match up with the monotheistic religions we have today, and they are largely rejected as "pagan." In antiquity, however, they were quite widespread. Human civilization was in a constant state of flux, with every conquering or change of dynasty bringing with it a new faith to which all in the land were expected to convert. The sheer number of the gods created by man (estimated to be around 4000, but we can't account for those of which there is no surviving documentation) testifies to one thing: the Abrahamic god is not special. The only thing that separates him from Zeus, Thor, Shiva, Amun-Ra et al. is the fact that he currently has the most followers. But this, as history has taught us, means mostly nothing. The Roman religion was spread throughout the empire, which was between 30-40% of the world population at that time, larger than Christianity's hold on the world today. But then, where is Zeus now?

The point I'm making is that the God of Jesus Christ, or really any god for that matter, is small, and that is only compared to the human race, let alone the planet. In comparison to this grand and complex universe, he is miniscule. If this god is the one true god, it really doesn't make sense that documentation and worship of this god would make up such an incredibly minute piece of the universal puzzle. Earlier you asked how I could be right and so many others be wrong, now I've got to ask you the same. So with that in mind, why would it be rational to think this god is more real and worthy of worship than any other?

[Jeffonthenet]

I think it is reasonable at this point to review the claims that I have made, and subject them to Knockemoutt’s critiques.

- Claim 1: There is no inconsistency between believing in the God of Jesus Christ and acting rationally in holding this belief. C ⊃ CAI – if C (Christianity) is true, it is not unlikely that Christianity will appear irrational (CAI)
The appearance of irrationality seems to me to be a false-positive… as it is not unlikely that the appearance of irrationality is exactly what one should expect if Christianity is true. Long before Darwin or even modern science, it seems to be claimed… in the New Testament that Christianity is intended to appear irrational

- Claim 2: There is no persuasive argument against the God of Jesus Christ

In response to claim 1, you say…

So basically, the bible explains it all away by saying "and if none of it makes sense, that's because it's not supposed to." I don't see how that means it's rational to believe in the God of Jesus Christ, if anything it sounds more like an excuse for being irrational. Even then, your arguments there are on the basis that Christianity is true, which is a pretty big "if." Biblical errancy aside, using the bible to justify the contents of the bible is rather redundant if you're trying to be convincing (unless of course you're going to try to use the fear of Hell.)

Knockemoutt, I appreciate the comments. I myself have spent much time likewise questioning the logic I am using in fear that it is not sound. However, I do not think it has been refuted and let me explain why. Though you have parodied my argument a bit, even if I take your words literally and entirely seriously—“none of it makes sense, that’s because it is not supposed to”—this is not an illogical claim. Say that I was an abstract artist and made a painting that when looked upon by a traditional medieval artist looks like nonsense. He may not consider it a painting at all. However, my abstract artist made the art for the very reason of getting the traditional artist to question what really it means to make art in the first place. It does not follow that such a sitation is impossible simply because the painting was intentionally not supposed to make sense to a traditional way of looking at things.

It also seems to me that you are claiming that my assertions here are ad-hoc, as you seem to take these as simply excuses in the face of the evidence. However, this is one reason why I quoted the New Testament, as it is long before Darwin or modern biblical criticism which questioned biblical inerrancy. However, no one doubts that the New Testament is the foundational document of Christianity and occurred long before Darwin or even modern science. Since the claims are found in strong terms in the New Testament itself, it doesn’t seem fair to accuse me of offering an ad-hoc explination as the explination was there long before the objection. (if I am correct that this is what you are doing.

I would also like to clarify the position that I am debating. When I agreed to this debate, I saw myself as maintaining a negative case against the claim that Christianity is irrational. Therefore, I agreed to defend the position that Christianity is not irrational. However, I am not taking this as equivalent to the claim that Christianity is rational. Before anyone judges me as playing games with words, please let me explain. To show that justified Christianity belief based upon the experience of God is rational, I would be required to show that this experience is actually from God. However, as such experiences are inward and so cannot be demonstrated externally as proof of God, I am unable to produce these experiences. However, I do not see any argument sufficient to disprove one who has had experiences from God after subjecting them to questioning. Therefore, since the arguments against Christianity’s rationality are external, they are something that I can deal with, and so seemed a fair topic of debate… especially when claims to know that Christianity is irrational are everywhere found on posts here. So I will not be demonstrating that Christianity is rational, as it would require me to produce something which is impossible to produce—the experience of God. However, I can defend the belief that even if one has not experienced God in a Christian way, this person is no position to say that Christianity is irrational. (and this is what I have been defending) This seems to be a very significant claim to me, (and no small one) as many people seem to take if for granted that we know that, or it is highly probable that Christianity is irrational.


The other claim I am maintaining is this: there is no successful argument against the God of Jesus Christ

Here I still think it is the case that historical objections against Jesus teaching in a Christian or somewhat Christian manner would not be a conclusive argument against Christianity even if I were to grant that they are sucesseful as it could be seen as adding further to the irrational crust of the rationally inwardly tender steak of Christianity (forgive me, I desire a steak a the moment…) However, I do see no reason to grant that any historical objection that you have raised as calling into question the picture of Jesus painted in the New Testament. I will first quote your comments relevant to this, and then respond.

27 to 47 years may be short by the standards of history itself, but for an individual (and that's what we're talking about here; the lifetime of a man) that's plenty of time to more or less have their way with otherwise undocumented history. Of course, that's assuming the bible is a reliable historical record.

I do not believe that your skepticism about the historical Jesus painted in the Gospels is warranted, and let me explain why.

As one scholar writes,

“…historians frequently trust ancient authors who wrote about events that preceded them by greater spans of time than forty to sixty years and who were not directly connected to the events they wrote about…for example, much of what historians believe we know about first-century Jewish history comes from a single source—Josephus—writing about events that in some cases predate him by more than a century. So too, much of what historians believe we know about the Persian wars comes from a single source—Herodotus—writing roughly seventy years after the fact. And a good deal of what we think we know about Alexander the great comes from a single source—Arrian—writing roughly four centuries after Alexander lived.” (The Jesus Legend, p. 93)

It is also the case that we have multiple independent sources represented in the gospels… I am not referring to the gospels themselves, but the source material that scholar suppose that they contain. (The material that is in Matthew and Luke but not in Mark is one example) So it seems that there is no good reason to distrust the gospels based on the few decades between their being written down and Jesus’ life. We also find an almost (if not entirely) unprecendented amount of manuscripts which are close to the origional texts from which we can know that the texts we receive are reliably consistent with the origonals.

You ask how I could know that people could not have experienced God. To that, I will respond similarly; how can you know that they have? Many people in the world may very well claim experiences of this god, but how do we know for certain that it is indeed a divine experience and not something else? The church encourages the belief that these are in fact experiences of God, so naturally that's what adherents would believe. My assumption that these experiences are not divine is not an unjustified assumption, but a default position. I will assume a lack of existence or effect unless I have evidence to the contrary. A personal experience without any way to substantiate it cannot be submitted as evidence.

I do not intend my personal experience as evidence… forgive me if that is how I came across. I am only claiming that there is no rational inconsistency in beliving that Christianity is true based on an experience one believes that they have had with God provided that they subject their experience to questioning. Correct that the Church probably influences people to think they have experienced God when they have not… however, that is not to say that people could not have experienced God in truth. Also, it seems to me irrational to disbelieve in the possibility of people experiencing God simply because you have not experienced God yourself. Call it the default belief or whatever you want, but I don’t see how it is rational to do this.

As for the conceptual size of God, I will explain… Let's think for a moment about the size of religion compared to the populace. Judaism has been around for about 5,000 years. For the most part they don't take any converts, so it's mostly who's been born into the faith. Christianity has existed for just under 2,000 years. Even if we combine these Abrahamic faiths, it's still not a very large amount of people, given how many people it is we're talking about. As of 2012, Christians make up between 31-35% of the current world population of an estimated 7 billion, less than half of the world. If we consider the age of these religions compared to the age of the human race, about 100,000 years (using scientific data, not religious text), we find that this god has only existed for about 5% of mankind's existence. If we compare all of this to the total number of people estimated to ever have been born, we find that only about 1.75% (barring fluctuations in demographics; this number isn't perfectly accurate but it's a basic estimation, the real number is perhaps smaller) of people who have ever lived (estimated in 2011 to be 107,602,707,791) believe or believed in the God of Jesus Christ.

This, however, is not even the full picture. We must also take into consideration the other religions which have existed throughout human history. The classical faiths of the ancient Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians were polytheistic, and quite materialistic in comparison to other faiths; their beliefs in no way match up with the monotheistic religions we have today, and they are largely rejected as "pagan." In antiquity, however, they were quite widespread. Human civilization was in a constant state of flux, with every conquering or change of dynasty bringing with it a new faith to which all in the land were expected to convert. The sheer number of the gods created by man (estimated to be around 4000, but we can't account for those of which there is no surviving documentation) testifies to one thing: the Abrahamic god is not special. The only thing that separates him from Zeus, Thor, Shiva, Amun-Ra et al. is the fact that he currently has the most followers. But this, as history has taught us, means mostly nothing. The Roman religion was spread throughout the empire, which was between 30-40% of the world population at that time, larger than Christianity's hold on the world today. But then, where is Zeus now?

The point I'm making is that the God of Jesus Christ, or really any god for that matter, is small, and that is only compared to the human race, let alone the planet. In comparison to this grand and complex universe, he is miniscule. If this god is the one true god, it really doesn't make sense that documentation and worship of this god would make up such an incredibly minute piece of the universal puzzle. Earlier you asked how I could be right and so many others be wrong, now I've got to ask you the same. So with that in mind, why would it be rational to think this god is more real and worthy of worship than any other?

I don’t want to delay my post longer, so I will respond only briefly to this… though I do think my response is still adequate to quell your objection. The fact that Christianity has existed only for two millennia (though one could say it is a form of Judaism which existed for about three times that long), doesn’t show that it is false unless you suppose that it must also be the case that the Christian God must have only existed one all of his properties have been revealed. It is also not the case that if Christianity is true that we must suppose that all people before Christ went to hell, as even the bible states that people before Christ such as David, and even (by implication of the story) people who were not even Jews like Job went to heaven. Furthermore, I could point out how even some humans (if I remember correctly) like 30,000 years ago believed in the afterlife as they would bury themselves with their tools. It is also the case that the bible never claims to be a record of everything that God ever did, (it actually says that all of the books in the world are unable to hold the accounts of all the things God has done) so it is quite possible that Christianity be true and God had revealed himself in some way to previous generation. Ultimately, though they seem at first quite appealing, upon further investigation, I don’t see much logical force in Knockemoutt’s comments here.


P.s. I think we should agree to a number of further replies so that this debate doesn’t go for infinite time. What do you think about 2 more replies each?

[KnockEmOuttt]

Firstly, I would like to further clarify this debate. If you are arguing that Christianity is not irrational, by corollary you are arguing that it is rational. If the entire basis of your argument is that no one can disprove you, then you haven't really come for a debate. Furthermore, you wish to make claims of rationality (or "non-irrationality" if you like) without any real evidence which is basis for them to be rejected outright. Trying to prove a negative is silly.

We can argue on and on about historical/biblical accuracy but it really has little to do with the whole thing. Mistakes and contradictions in the bible and other historical documents don't inherently mean the entire thing is wrong, but it certainly doesn't help the overall credibility and integrity of the thing (at least not to the discerning and skeptical eye.)

It is certainly rational to doubt claims of the divine by default. Critical evaluation of claims is a rational practice. If I have not experienced the divine, and those who claim they have cannot produce any evidence in favor of that claim, it is rational to disbelieve the claim. As Christopher Hitchens once said, "that what can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence."

I believe you've misunderstood my final argument. I'm not making any statement about afterlives or the like. I am simply comparing the size of this god's following to the size of the historical populace. It speaks only to the the number of adherents this god has had in proportion to all those other people who did not believe likewise, take from it what you will. I see postulating the methods of how God "revealed himself" differently to various peoples and generations as nothing more than apologetics.

Feel free to limit your responses. I will respond as I see necessary.

[Jeffonthenet]

Hello everyone,

Please forgive me for the late response, I have been busy with work and just life in general lately. I was also avoiding responding as I was worried this would either devolve into bickering or go completely off topic.

With regards to what I am defending in this debate, and Knockemoutt's accusation of me, I can say that I understand, and myself have wondered if I am defending a fair position in this debate. However, I explained my logic entirely in my last post. I thought the only honest thing to do in my situation (see last post) was to defend the negative claim, "belief in God is not irrational," rather than a positive one, claiming that I could show that God belief in God is rational. Anyone who still has problems with my claims I would just ask that you look over the reasoning I already presented in defense of this in my last post.

And regardless of what one thinks of me or the position I am taking in this debate, I would like to point out that none of it is relevant to the truth of the points I am making, or the logic with which I conclude these points. It would be to succumb to the logical fallacy called ad-homineum to think that an accusation against a person would refute this person's arguments.

Therefore, regardless of what Knockemoutt thinks of the topic I am debating, if he does not show the fault with my arguments and logic, regardless of what he claims of my actions in defending only the points I am defending, then the points go through. So I will ask, is he willing to grant that, as I have maintained, there is no rational inconsistency between acting rationally and believing in God when doing so? If he is not willing to do this, has he refuted my arguments in favor of this proposition? Is he also willing to grant that, as I have argued for, there is no successful argument against the God of Jesus Christ? If not, he ought to give some convincing reason these things are false or that my arguments for their truth are false. I am not saying he has not tried, but I want to point out that if he doesn't succeed, and only focuses on my supposed faults in defending a negative, the points I have maintained go through.

In his most recent post Knockemoutt, though seeming to drop many of his past objections, has introduced some new ones. I will quote them and respond.

Furthermore, you wish to make claims of rationality (or "non-irrationality" if you like) without any real evidence which is basis for them to be rejected outright…
It is certainly rational to doubt claims of the divine by default. Critical evaluation of claims is a rational practice. If I have not experienced the divine, and those who claim they have cannot produce any evidence in favor of that claim, it is rational to disbelieve the claim. As Christopher Hitchens once said, "that what can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence."

If it is rational to disbelieve a claim because evidence cannot be produced for this claim… if that which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence as Hitchens said, then it is true that a common instance where children who are victims of sexual assault, only long after tell someone about it when the evidence is gone, must be disbelieved and their assertions dismissed. This seems to follow directly from your logic which says, "that which can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence." If we have found an instance where something ought not to be dismissed without evidence despite being asserted without evidence, then we have disproved Hitchens' principle and so your argument here. And I think I have provided such an instance.

Trying to prove a negative is silly.

I am not trying to prove a negative, only to argue for it. And it would seem that one who tries to argue that 1x1 is not 0, is also acting silly by this logic, as he is arguing for a negative statement.

I believe you've misunderstood my final argument. I'm not making any statement about afterlives or the like. I am simply comparing the size of this god's following to the size of the historical populace. It speaks only to the the number of adherents this god has had in proportion to all those other people who did not believe likewise, take from it what you will. I see postulating the methods of how God "revealed himself" differently to various peoples and generations as nothing more than apologetics.

I don't see why the fact that it was only 2000 years ago that God fully revealed Himself or that a few thousand years earlier he had revealed more of Himself than previously available suggests that there is no God. How do you know that if there is a God, he wouldn't act like this? One could also likewise accuse you of using "nothing more than atheist apologetics" here as you have accused my of using nothing more than Christian apologetics. However, I am not accusing you of this, I want to focus on the logic of the matter, and I don't see how you have given a persuasive logical argument against God here.

This was my second to last response. Every debate I have ever heard limited the responses for the benefit of all parties involved, and we have already had a good amount of rebuttals. My next post will be my closing statement. I hope that Knockemoutt will take the opportunity in his next response to fully interact with my points in this debate and bring out everything he has, in order to argue against my claims with his best evidence for the benefit of everyone watching and the furthering of rational thought.

[KnockEmOuttt]

Firstly, I'd like to object to your ad-hominem accusation. Ad-hominem would be something like "why should we listen to Jeffonthenet? The guy is a total crook anyway." I haven't once done anything of the sort. Please do not mistake my attacks against your arguments as attacks against your personal character. Personal offense and insult have no place in a debate.

If it is rational to disbelieve a claim because evidence cannot be produced for this claim… if that which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence as Hitchens said, then it is true that a common instance where children who are victims of sexual assault, only long after tell someone about it when the evidence is gone, must be disbelieved and their assertions dismissed.

Well, yes. That's true, but of course that's how the legal system works. Innocence is presumed until guilt is proven. If someone makes an accusation of sexual assault it gets investigated, and if there is no evidence that the accusation is true, it gets dismissed. It seems like you're arguing in such cases we should presume guilt. In addition, this seems more like an appeal to emotion than anything. "Who dare argue against sexual assault victims?" It's a poor tactic.

I am not trying to prove a negative, only to argue for it. And it would seem that one who tries to argue that 1x1 is not 0, is also acting silly by this logic, as he is arguing for a negative statement.

The difference is that we know that 1x1 is 1. For that reason we can deduce that it is not 0. Therefore, if you want to show that belief in God is not irrational, you need to show what it is in place of being irrational. With that said, you have yet to show how belief in god is anything other than irrational. "Not irrational," if it does not simply mean "rational," is far too vague.

I don't see why the fact that it was only 2000 years ago that God fully revealed Himself or that a few thousand years earlier he had revealed more of Himself than previously available suggests that there is no God.

So you mean to say you believe that the god of Jesus Christ (remembering that in this debate we're talking about this god specifically) spent a few thousand years masquerading as Zeus, Thor, Athena, Amun-Ra, and Baal before settling down as Yahweh? I don't use this argument to suggest there is no god, but to demonstrate that there is nothing to suggest there is more reason to believe in your god over any others.

One could also likewise accuse you of using "nothing more than atheist apologetics" here as you have accused my of using nothing more than Christian apologetics.

And what, pray tell, do you mean by atheist apologetics? I don't think I've come up with any apologies for my atheism, I simply see no evidence of God. No need for an excuse there.

Again, I'd like to point out that the biggest issue is the vagueness of your argument. If belief in God is not irrational, but you're not arguing that it's rational, then what exactly is it that you're arguing? If you're simply saying "no, it's not irrational," then what is it instead? You're rejecting my assertion and submitting nothing in its place, and so because of this it appears to be half an argument.

[Jeffonthenet]

I began this debate by stating the claims that I would defend. The first is this,

1. There is no inconsistency between believing in the God of Jesus Christ and acting rationally in holding this belief

The second is this,

2. There is no successful argument against the God of Jesus Christ

Before getting into the more recent developments of this debate, I would like to examine how these claims have held up from the beginning. In my first post, I defended both of these claims by arguing that the God of Jesus Christ is not dependant upon the doctrine of biblical inerrancy (that the bible has no error), and that, in fact, contrary to a superficial first-look at the situation, if Christianity were true it is not improbable that one ought to expect the alleged difficulties with the bible and science. This being the case, such alleged difficulties are no evidence against Christianity, since they are what one ought to expect to be the case if it were true. I also represented this in symbolic logic in my opening statement.

I also defended that in the absence of demonstrable evidence, one can be rational in holding to a belief if it is based on an experience. For example, if I fed everyday a stray cat, and no one else saw the cat but me, until one day it disappeared, I would be justified in believing that there was a cat that I used to feed every day based on my experience of feeding this cat, even though I could not produce any evidence for the existence of the cat. Right that it is that someone who has not seen this cat has not had this experience, but at least this person is not justified in accusing me of being irrational by believing that I indeed fed this cat simply because I cannot produce the evidence of this cat.

In his first reply, Knockemoutt responded by presenting what he saw as objections against the rationality of accepting what was written about Jesus in the bible. However, when it comes down to it, his objections were irrelevant to the points I am maintaing as they do not constitute a successful argument against my God or the rationality of believing in Him. After a bit of debate on the topic, by his 6th post he seemed to accept this, saying, “we can argue on an on about historical/biblical accuracy but it really has little to do with the whole thing.” So it seems that he has granted one of my main contentions, that the God of Jesus Christ is not dependant upon biblical inerrancy. If this still seems strange to anyone, I would point out that it is the duty of a follower of Jesus to put their faith in God alone. Though it sometimes seems that many have put the bible as virtually a member of the trinity, I do not.

In his first reply he also argued that the God I am presenting is too small to be real. (his “conceptual size of God” argument) To the logic he presented, I replied by pointing out some faulty assumptions in his logic such as the identification of the beginning of the existence of the Christian God with the beginning of Judaism or Christianity. I pointed out that there is no reason to suppose that the Christian God was not active in the world simply because he didn’t fully reveal Himself until later times. (see post #5 for more) In his next post he responded by pointing out the number of people who have ever lived compared to the number of people who are Christians. However, as I mentioned, a more complete knowledge of God being revealed later does not show that the God of Jesus Christ did not exist and was not active earlier. Even the bible doesn’t claim this as we see even in the Old Testament, non-Jewish characters such as Job interacting with God… that is, it doesn’t claim that only at the outset of Judaism God acted in the world. (and the book of Job implies this for the reason I mentioned) I also mentioned, in relation to this, archeological finds from tens of thousands of years ago which show that pre-historic men believed in an afterlife. One also finds that many of the earliest societies to develop a writing system, even before the Jewish people, were monotheistic. We are in no position to say that the God of Jesus Christ has not acted before Judaism.

Knockemoutt also accused me of “using nothing more than Christian apologetics” here to which I can only ask my readers to carefully read what I have written, because I do not think he has accurately characterized me. In his most recent post, he says that I have claimed that God was masquerading as Zeus and other gods before Christianity. However, this is not what I have said. I only claimed that we have no reason to suppose God was entirely inactive before Christianity and Judaism. He also seems to introduce here the claim that we rationally disbelieve in Zeus while there is no more evidence for the Christian God. However, if it were (or if it is) true that God existed and made himself known by experience it seems like we do actually have more reasons to not just assume that God is irrational as one might do with Zeus. If the only evidence is experience, I do not see any people claiming that they have experienced the presence of Zeus. It is also the case that the very characteristics of Zeus probably suggest that if Zeus existed, he would make his existence more obvious because he would desire fame. (just going on my general knowledge of Greek gods, perhaps I am wrong in this case) Furthermore, the objections to Zeus in modern science such as that lightning is caused by his strong arms probably cannot be explained satisfactorily, as objections against the bible can be without being ad-hoc (as I have attempted to do in this debate… not that the biblical difficulties are nearly as difficult as the ones relevant to Zeus stories). I also do not think that the Zeus stories claim Zeus to be evidenced by internal non-demonstrable yet undeniable experience. (as it is with the Christian God)

Furthermore, we also see that since the evidence of God is internal and experiential, and we ought to expect that people are testifying to this experience. However, I have never run across a person who testifies to the experience of Zeus which suggests that no such people experience him. I suspect at this point that Knockemoutt will mention the other religious claims to experience from religions that contradict Christianity. To this, I reply that I would not be justified in a debate setting to accuse them of being irrational simply because their belief is based on experience rather than demonstrable evidence. Granted that I think of them as acting irrational in holding these beliefs because of my own experience, but I will not propose that for acceptance in our court of irrationality here, and it will be consistent with my intent here if my audience does not either. It is also quite possible that these other religions will not be able to defend against claims of ad-hocness and irrationality that Christianity can and that I have presented in this debate.

Another of Knockemoutt’s main points was that it was “rational to doubt claims of the divine by default. Critical evaluation of claims is a rational practice. If I have not experienced the divine, and those who claim they have cannot produce any evidence in favor of that claim, it is rational to disbelieve the claim. As Christopher Hitchens once said, ‘that what can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence."

In response to the first part of this, the claim of justified unbelief (that one rationally disbelieves without evidence) does not show that it is irrational to believe in God for everyone who does. However, the latter claim, is what Knockemoutt is maintaining as it is his side in the debate. In response to the Hitchens quote, I gave one instance where a person has only the evidence of their experience and is not irrational in holding to their belief that the experience indeed happened. The example I gave was a child who was abused and only later told someone about it much later when there was no evidence. Knockemoutt claimed that I brought up this point for emotional effect when it was entirely a logical point as it was the most clear case I could think of where one had a justified belief without demonstrable evidence. In response to this, Knockemoutt said that a court could not convict a person of abuse simply on the testimony of an incident where the evidence was gone. However, if I were to grant him this, we must still recognize that this is the court of rationality were are arguing at, it is not a court of law. The law is thankfully not in the business of declaring one to be irrational (save in the case of insanity). If this were the case, and we used the logic Knockemoutt proposed, we must then declare every victim of a crime irrational who cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that their attacker was so-and-so.

Another of Knockemoutt’s main points in the debate was that I am not defending my claim properly by giving positive evidence for it. I have defended the claim, that belief in God is not irrational, by maintaining a negative stance against arguments that belief in God is irrational. However, I would like to point out that I have been entirely consistent throughout this debate in defending this in the way I have done so. I chose this topic because I wanted the audience to see if claims that Christianity is irrational could stand up to scrutiny. Given what has been said, I don’t think they can. I also believe based on personal experience and not on some demonstrable piece of evidence, and the rationality of doing this I have also defended as a positive claim in this debate.

And even if I grant entirely to Knockemoutt that I have not succeeded in providing us real positive reasons to think that Christianity is rational, I think I have succeeded in showing that we have seen no successful reasons to think Christianity is irrational. If one thinks the proper position at this point is to take neither side and simply remain undecided on whether or not belief in God is rational, I would be entirely happy with that decision. If this means that neither of us one the debate, I confess that I don’t care. His decision would be accepting the points I have actually defended in this debate, because he has accepted that we are in no position to declare belief in the God of Jesus Christ irrational.

To wrap it up my last reply, I would like to thank Knockemoutt for participating and our audience for taking their valuable time to investigate this important issue. My hope is that whatever conclusion one comes to, everyone will focus on the logic of both sides of this debate and give each debater a fair hearing by reading each debater’s posts in their own words while doing their best to look at the logic of what is presented on each side without bias (as much as this is possible).

Thank you,

- Jeff

[KnockEmOuttt]

Jeffonthenet argues that there is no inconsistency between believing in the God of Jesus Christ and acting rationally in holding that belief. On the contrary, belief in God is the source of plenty of irrational actions. Many reject commonly known facts because they conflict with such beliefs (I'll go for an easy one: evolution), all without any basis other than their religion. This is a rather irrational practice. He also contends that there is no successful argument against the God of Jesus Christ. Just for starters:

1. There is not one shred of admissible evidence for this god's existence.
2. There have been many gods/goddesses worshipped by man throughout history which contradict and conflict with this god. There is no more reason to believe this god to be true than any other.
3. Much of what has been attributed to this god (creation) has been found to have come about in other ways (evolution, abiogenesis [for which there is evidence], the Big Bang). Intelligent Design is not a compromise between these, it is just creationism in a lab coat.

These just scratch the surface.

Jeffonthenet brings up an analogy of feeding a stray cat. A stray cat, however, is a rather likely occurrence, and it's one which can probably be verified with proper investigation. Conversely, it is still also possible that this cat was in fact a delusion, or perhaps something other than it was perceived to be. Most importantly, a stray cat is a physical, external thing, where as a religious experience is internal. The difference must be noted.

Jeffonthenet is somewhat right on one thing; this god is not necessarily dependent on biblical inerrancy. Historical errors in certain places (albeit a great deal of places, but it's a big book) do not mean the entire thing is automatically null and void. They do, however, damage the overall credibility and integrity of the thing, and thus the bible cannot be taken as a reliable source and it should be critically dissected.

I never said that this god was too small to be real. Rather, I said that this god is too small to be probable. The point here, which perhaps was missed by Jeffonthenet, is that there is no more reason to believe this god is real than any other. As much as we cannot suppose that "the Christian God was not active in the world simply because he didn't fully reveal himself until later times", we also cannot suppose that he was active. As far as the records go, the odds are not in this god's favor. Archaeological finds may suggest that pre-historic men believed in an afterlife, but that proves nothing about this god specifically, just that religion-like beliefs may have existed at that time.

The gods and goddesses worshipped by past civilizations were likely "experienced" much in the same way one "experiences" the god of Jesus Christ. They inspired countless monuments, documents, works of art, works of literature, etc. as well as devout ritual. The main reason the ancient Greeks can't claim to experience Zeus is because the civilization no longer exists. Had that civilization made it to the present day, Jeffonthenet would perhaps be "experiencing" their gods and goddesses instead of that of Jesus Christ. Just a thought.

The abused child argument was certainly out of place. Jeffonthenet seems to suggest we should take things on circumstantial evidence alone. Courts of law pursue trials with rationality. Whatever court you decide we're in, it's not rational to take something as truth on just a bit of circumstantial evidence. And I stand by my assertion of appeal to emotion, in fact I would cite "if this were the case, and we used the logic Knockemoutt proposed, we must then declare every victim of a crime irrational who cannot prove beyond a reasonable doubt that their attacker was so-and-so" as a further appeal to emotion. That said, in this scenario it is not the accuser who would be irrational. The irrationality would lie with those who believe the accusations without anything other than personal testimony.

My issue with Jeffonthenet's arguments is that he's done nothing other than try to refute all arguments against his stance without really providing any reasons why belief in the Christian god is anything other than irrational, aside from saying that the bible says Christianity will seem irrational which is both A) begging the question and B) doesn't show at all how belief in this god is not irrational.

What I've mainly gathered from Jeffonthenet's arguments and closing statement is that he's trying to defend the argument from personal incredulity; that we should accept an explanation of an experience even though there is no evidence that this is true and there may be a more reasonable explanation. This as we all know is a logical fallacy, and therefore irrational.

I thank Jeffonthenet for his time and hope that anyone who stopped to look at this debate found it an interesting read.