Last weekend, I got involved in an interesting comment thread on a post by Justin Taylor, reposting a section of an essay by David Powlison called “I Am Motivated When I Feel Desire.” Essentially, it’s about why people succumb to “lusts of the flesh” and engage in “ungodly” behaviors. Powlison quotes James 1:13-16 to say that God doesn’t tempt people, their own lusts tempt them and God has nothing to do with it.
I commented to point out a couple instances in the Bible where it says that God does in fact tempt people, or even directly force people, to behave badly. I’m not sure how one could reconcile this with presumably equally valid sentences which say that God does not tempt us and that people’s bad behavior is their own doing. A couple people came to assure me that if I were to “ask God to open [my] mind” and be sure that I had “either His Spirit illuminating that study or even a desire to know the God whom [I am] questioning,” I’d find the answers I was looking for. I think responses like that sound like a cop-out more than anything, and I said as much. You can peruse all the comments if you’re interested in the overall dynamic, but that’s the basic background.
A fellow named Wesley did step up and offer his ideas about how to resolve the contradiction I brought up. Our posts in the comment thread were getting exceedingly long, so I decided I’d answer him here. Wesley, if you’re reading this — I welcome your feedback, wherever you’d prefer to write it. If you’d like to answer me in a post at your own blog, I’ll definitely link to it here at mine.
Let me make it clear from the beginning that I don’t believe in any god, including the Christian one, in the first place. That being said, I think it’s worth noting that the Bible is hardly clear on the topic of whether God tempts people to do bad things. That lack of clarity (on this and other topics related to the nature of God) is a major part of why, even if I did become convinced that some sort of deity existed, I would not believe in the Christian version of that deity. There are so many contradictions, I don’t even know what the Christian version is.
With that out of the way, let’s get to what Wesley wrote.
The first section is more a response to my mention of this old post, which in turn was in response to Wesley’s use of the old “God is incomprehensible” trope based on 1 Corinthians 2:14.
1. The incomprehensibility of God: God is incomprehensible in the sense that He is so vast and big ans wise that the faliable human mind could never fully grasp Him or they would (by definition) be gods themselves (see Isaiah 55:8-9 on this issue). That ebing said, Rom. 1 makes it very clear that God can be known to a certan degree b/c He has made Himself know to us; enough so that the Bible declares we are “without excuse” to say we don’t know about God. Scholars will then go on to say that He has revealed Himself both through creation (which is Heis general revelation) and through the person and work of Jesus and His word (which is special revelation). So God CAN be “known” to a certain degree, even without ever picking up a Bible; He can then be known further through what He has revealed to us about Himslef through His word the Biblel; finally re: the I Cor. passage i mentioned, we can know God even more fully and intimately as He indwells men and women by His Holy Spirit who “teaches us all things” and interprets and rebukes, etc. Again, God still remains incompehensible in that He can never be fuilly known, but He is a relational God who has also made Himself known.
Okay. What I think you’re saying is that God cannot be completely understood, but we can understand God to a large extent by observing the world around us (“creation”) and by studying the Bible. People who have the Holy Spirit dwelling in them (a concept I don’t understand — it sounds like demonic possession only by the “good guys”) are able to understand even more, but how you get to be one of those lucky people I’m not so sure.
The general principle is one I think I can get behind. In fact, I feel this way about most people I interact with. I can see their actions and hear their words, and through that get to know them as good friends, understand their likes and dislikes, and get a feel for their personalities. But there are some things about my friends that I will never really know. I can’t read their thoughts. I will never really know what it is like to live as them. On some level, they will always be alien to me.
However, I have a feeling this is not what you are describing with God. I have often heard it said by Christians that God is infinite but the human mind is finite, and a finite mind cannot comprehend something infinite. Setting aside the fact that we have mathematical theorems galore surrounding the concept of infinity, and people are certainly able to comprehend those … let’s suppose for a moment that this assertion is true. If a finite mind can only comprehend a finite amount of God’s nature, doesn’t that still leave an infinite amount of the nature of God that we can’t comprehend? That sounds like an essentially incomprehensible being, not a mostly comprehensible one.
Let’s put it this way. What parts of God’s nature would you say are beyond human comprehension? Does the incomprehensible constitute most of God’s nature, or a relatively small part of it?
2. As to God “tempting us” we need to first address a simple rule of Biblical interpretation that states: Scripture interprets Scripture, thus, if the Bible says clearly in James 1:13 that God tempts no one then if we find another passage that seems to contradict that,we need to examine it in the light of what we have read elsewhere.
Are you serious? This sounds like one of the worst rules I could imagine for how to resolve contradictions in the Bible. Let’s just say abstractly that we have one passage that says, “God does x” and we have another passage that says, “God never does x.” What does it mean to examine one passage “in the light of” the other one? It’s not as though one provides a slight refinement of the other’s idea; they say the exact opposite things. How do you choose which passage is the interpreting one, and which one is the interpreted? Do you always defer to the one that comes later in the Bible? (Is that later sequentially in the ordering of books, or later chronologically by the dates historians think they were written?) Or do you perhaps defer to whichever statement about x you would prefer to be true about God?
Another rule (OFTEN ignored by many Bible quoters) is that passages must be interpreted in light of their context both imediate and (going back to the first principle) from the Bible as a whole. So, if we look at the immediate context in chapter one of James we see we’re dealing with the “testing of one’s faith” and how that causes us to grow stronger/deeper/more mature in our faith.
I have trouble with the notion of “context” because I notice that in conversations with Christians, I am always told I am reading the Bible with the wrong amount of it. I don’t see how I am losing the context battle here. If it is important to interpret scripture using both the immediate context and the context of “the Bible as a whole,” why aren’t you bothered by the numerous biblical examples of God causing people to do bad things?
You seem to be arguing that James isn’t really talking about God tempting people per se, he’s talking about God testing people’s faith. But how does he do this? Is God not supposedly testing people by tempting them with sin, and then seeing if they succumb to their urges?
this principle of things growing stronger is universal in it’s application: think oak tree that is blown on constantly by ocean winds, etc. In my reading of the whole chapter, it seems in verse 13 James shifts gears to talk about failing or sinning in the midst of those trials/testing and seeking to be sure we don’t say our sin is God’s fault; almost like he’s anticipating a complaint and addressing it before it is made. So, while making it clear that God DOES test His children with, as verse 2 says, “various kinds of trials” for the purpose of our joy in maturity, he also makes it clear that the fault for sinful response or behaviour – inside or outside those circumstances – rests solely on us and not God.
In what way does it make sense to say that we are responsible for our behavior rather than God? I assume you believe that God made us the people we are, with some care for shaping each of us as individuals. If not, surely you believe that in creating humanity as a whole, God had control over what was to constitute “human nature.” Surely if this omnipotent creator God did not want people to be tempted by sin, he could have made us so that we did not find those things appealing. Then God — knowing full well that people are tempted by sin, being omniscient and all that — actively puts sin in our path to tempt us. Again, if he doesn’t want people to be tempted by sin, he probably shouldn’t be dangling sin right in the faces of people he created with the desire to sin. Any conventional understanding of culpability would lay the blame here at least in very large part on God.
(Of course, I agree in general that we, not God, bear the responsibility for our actions — but that’s because I don’t think that God exists. If you’re going to postulate an omnipotent being who’s running the universe, you can’t then say that bad things that happen aren’t at all the fault of that omnipotent being. It was, by definition, within that being’s power to stop the bad things, and it apparently didn’t.)
Now, taking this truth here that God does not tempt us (in the immediate context i think we can add “with evil” b/c of what the verse says about God not being tempted either) we can look at the Lord’s prayer and apply that to the phrase “lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil” and say, “ok, we know God doesn’t tempt us with evil and the verse goes on to intruct us to ask God to deliver us from evil (or the evil one) so … what else could be meant by this. In my thinking, and considering what Scripture teaches as a whole, this phrase is asking God to deliver us from Satan AND the circumstances he would place us in that might tempt us to sin, for Satan is most certainly one who tempts us with evil in order to ditract and destroy us. So the phrase could possibly be said, “lead us AWAY from/out from those circumstances where we would be tempted to sin”. In either case, the empasis of the phrase for me is clearly on the second half in which we ask God to deliver us from evil, and in doing that, we ask Him to lead us out of/away from circumstances where evil/Satan would tempt us to sin.
No, I won’t take this as truth. I still don’t see how we can logically conclude in the Christian framework that God clearly does not tempt us. But your further analysis about Satan makes the problem even worse. Who or what is Satan? If Satan tempts us with sin in order to destroy us, and God tempts us with sin in order to test us, it seems like a pretty fine line between good and evil here! Pretty weird that God and Satan would interact with humanity in basically the exact same way! Then, probably a more important issue — why does God allow Satan to exist, and/or why does he allow Satan to act the way he does? Is God not omnipotent? Is Satan more powerful than God? If God has the power to stop Satan, he should — otherwise he must be held, again, in very large part responsible for Satan’s evil actions.
Wesley, nothing I’ve read in your response has demonstrated a clear Christian consensus that God does not tempt us. Moreover, even if we were to grant that God does not tempt us, we’ve discussed the fact that God failing to stop us from being tempted is morally equivalent to actually tempting us. However, you did write at the end of your comment that this was a “pretty simple and incomplete” beginning to an answer to my question. If you have more to add to clarify your side, I would love to hear it!
Jojo the hun on 
Wesley
/ July 20, 2010 at 9:15 pmNFQ -
ok if i just comment here?
First off thanks for such a full and comprehensive response – I appreciate your willingness to engage in what i’ve written to you.
So, a couple things that stood out to me initially in what you’ve written:
1: You wrote, “That sounds like an essentially incomprehensible being, not a mostly comprehensible one.” and “Does the incomprehensible constitute most of God’s nature, or a relatively small part of it?” in my mind the answers to those are ‘yes, exactly’ and ‘yes, mostly incomprehensible’ respectively. God could, in one sense, reveal everything about Himslef that our finite minds could hold/understand and there would still, by definition, be an infinte amount of stuff about Him that we could not know b/c there is always a “ceiling” for us that does not exist for Him. Make sense?
2: As to my first “rule” of interpretation viz. Scripture interprets Scripture, i think the initial problem you’re having with that is that you begin with the presupposition when you find statements that seem to contradict, that you are right and the infinite God of the universe who wrote those statements is wrong/mistaken/etc. and needs to explain Himself to you. So i begin with the understanding in my worldview of an inerrant, God-breathed, Bible that is complete and infalliable so, when i come across something that doesn’t add-up or whatever, a more humble approach would phrase that difficulty by saying (at least!) ‘there seems to be a contradiction between this passage and this passage’, and then dig deeper, study, pray for wisdom to try and work that out. If you beging with the presupposition that the Bible is not inerrant or, as some liberal theologians suggest, “the words of men about God” as opposed to the words of God, then of course you would reject such a “rule of interpretation” from the outset.
3: As to the context issue, it’s hard to say w/o reading other conversations, why you’ve been told you aren’t using the proper amount. The principle itself though (context) would seem to be pretty self evident: statements we make (or have made), for instance, need to be interprted with regard to what you’re talking about in that moment as well as statements you’ve made previously about the same/or related issue. But it seems like what you’re saying is that you ARE, in fact, looking at the whole picture and that’s what’s confusing you – is that right? In taking that, i’ll assume that you have read the whole Bible and not simply done a word-search for “testing” and “tempting” in the Bible b/c, if that were the case, the context argument would (once again) work against you and not in your favour.
So, you said re: the context of James, “Is God not supposedly testing people by tempting them with sin, and then seeing if they succumb to their urges?” Simply: no. As i said later in my post, even taking the whole verse together which says, “Let no one say when tempted, “I am being tempted by god,” for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself tempts no one.” we see the words “God cannot be tempted by evil” and i think it IS a fair hermeneutic to add that same “with evil” to the second part of the phrase ” He Himself tempts no one [with evil]“. so the testing comes from circumstances which He would either allow or bring about to cause us to grow in our faith and trust in Him. In fact, James (and by implication then God) writes this verse specifically to address the very point you still seem to want to make regardless: that God does not tempt us either to sin or with sin. I’ll try to give you a “for instance”: let’s say God allows me to lose my job b/c He has another job He wants for me or place He wants me to move to that i wouldn’t if i still had that job; whatever the reason – it will ultimately be for His glory and to cause me to rely more fully on Him to provide all my needs. Now, if i lose my job and say, ‘ok God – i trust that You are good and will provide for all my needs’ and then wait in hope for Him to do that, then i grow and mature in my faith. However, if i lose my job and just get angry or depressed and start drinking my life away, or beat up my wife or kids, or blow up the place that fired me, I am the one responsible for those actions, not God. His action was intended for my good and had nothing to do with sin. Jame’s point here (and this point is defintiely seen throughout Scripture) is that we all have sinful, rebellious hearts and minds and we are not to blame God when we at according to that sinful nature.
4: You write, “In what way does it make sense to say that we are responsible for our behavior rather than God?” and qualify that by saying, “I assume you believe that God made us the people we are …” and such. Sadly, we once again come to a context issue b/c your argument is entirely valid from the Bible … until you get to Gen. chapter 3 where everything that God created on this earth is fractured by the entrance of sin into the world. This is the beginning of the gospel message itself that God created all that is as good and then sin entered into the world and all that was broken.
5: You then write, “Surely if this omnipotent creator God did not want people to be tempted by sin, he could have made us so that we did not find those things appealing.” Ahhhh, this is one of those ones that would take much more time to discuss. It is what is sometimes presented as “the problem of sin” and has long, far reaching explainations and implications. See these few articles for a beginning on this:
“http://www.desiringgod.org/Blog/787_does_god_emcauseem_sin”
So, suffice it to say by now that God is not the author of sin nor does He tempt us with sin, though He has, for reasons that we don;t fully understand, allowed sin to enter into the world (for if He did not at least permit it then it could not be so). I’ll save you a response here and point out that i said we don’t fully understand it in all of it’s complexity but there are good and reasonable arguments for the concept on the whole. (again, see articles above).
6: “But your further analysis about Satan makes the problem even worse. Who or what is Satan? If Satan tempts us with sin in order to destroy us, and God tempts us with sin in order to test us, it seems like a pretty fine line between good and evil here!” This statement and subsequent arguments do not represent my position as it is my understanding that God does not tempt us with sin.
7: “why does God allow Satan to exist, and/or why does he allow Satan to act the way he does? Is God not omnipotent? Is Satan more powerful than God? If God has the power to stop Satan, he should — otherwise he must be held, again, in very large part responsible for Satan’s evil actions.” Again, see articles:
“http://www.desiringgod.org/Blog/787_does_god_emcauseem_sin”
all relating to the “problem of evil”
8: ” we’ve discussed the fact that God failing to stop us from being tempted is morally equivalent to actually tempting us” The “fact”?!? Haven’t discussed that nor is that a fact. The failure to stop someone from being tempted is in no way morally equivalent to actually tempting us! think that through logically: is an alcoholic tempted to drink? Even if i were able to restrict EVERY means of him seeing or being reminded of drinking, would he still be tempted to drink? If i do all i can to show him the goodness of NOT drinking and offert o help in every way i can to support him in not drinking and he still chooses to drink, ami morally responsible? This is, in a lot of ways, exactly how God deals with us! The point of this text, and countless others, is that God has given us every means we need NOT to sin but we still choose that sin in spite of it b/c the desire/will to sin dwells inside of us. We are therfore guilty of that sin not b/c ANYONE “made” us do it but b/c we desire to do that very thing in our very being. And, as i;ve already said, that is NOT how we were created as Gen. 1 and 2 clearly state.
More to say but i’m interested in your thoughts so far. Don’[t want to get too far ahead of myself.
W.
Wesley
/ July 20, 2010 at 10:35 pmThis just came to me as well:
If you look at the book just previous to James (Hebrews) and then in I Corinthians, we see two texts that will inform the issue even more:
1: In speaking of Jesus becoming a man, the author writes, “Therefore, he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation [big word that basically means a payment in full] for the sins of the people. Because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is also able to help those who are bing tempted.
So now we have even Jesus being tempted. It’s important to note as well that being tempted is not sin for if it was than when Jesus is tempted in the wildreness by the devil in the gospels, he sins and therefore he is not who He said He was.
2. in I Cor. 10:13 Paul writes, “No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.”
Now here we have Paul (and God) telling us that there is not temptation that is not common to to mankind or our humanity and that God, of course being omniscient knowing each and every temptation that will come, provides a way of escape from it so that we WON’T sin. Would God be trying to help us escape something that He placed on us? Did Nazi soldiers try and help Jews escape concentration camps? The implication is compelling anyways in light of what you’re proposing as a “clear” contradiction in the Bible.
NFQ
/ July 20, 2010 at 11:28 pmHi Wesley — your reply here is fine, I just wanted to make sure you knew you didn’t have to use the comments if you found the space too restrictive.
This is a whole lot of stuff! I wish I was able to digest and respond to it all right now but that’s just not realistic. Hopefully tomorrow.
jpm
/ July 22, 2010 at 3:52 amNFQ,
Incomprehensibility has shades to it. We may know the nature of God through revelation (Scripture more clearly, but nature to an extent also), even if we do not know the full depth of those attributes….in this way Christians often say God is comprehensible and incomprehensible. Those descriptions should not be a problem logically to an atheist since such descriptions also are used illustratively in Science (as to light being wave-like and particle-like in behavior). We say the reality is hard to grasp, its essence easier.
All language being referential or analogous, we have to deal with speaking of God in that way. When we speak of music in the language of colors, as it were, some of the fine detail is left out. Until our language becomes capable of carrying some heavier concepts (which seems not so likely) we will be left with analogous terms that convey planes of truth without fully showing how they intersect and harmonize with perpendicular planes of truth. I say this in reference to how can Scripture say “God tempts no man” and “God tempted Israel”.
Context is always the Christian A-bomb to deal with criticism of the Bible, but many Christians think through these issues deeply. Many Christians hypothetically flirt with the idea of atheism, see its implications, and retreat back into theism as a necessary condition for any examination. I myself find it more likely that if a perfect Being existed, and allowed what IS to be…he would be perfectly free from all guiding influences of ‘sin’ on his creatures, even though he might manipulate their activities through other means. We say “God can hit a straight shot with a crooked stick.” That’s what we mean by God doesn’t tempt, yet God can tempt. God does not tempt in order to ruin, but God can use what is ruined to make right. Yes it takes a leap of faith no less of a span than atheists leap.
I enjoy the discussion. Nice site.
NFQ
/ July 22, 2010 at 7:52 amAll right, here goes!
@Wesley:
1. Yes, this is basically what I explained above in my question to you. But I am still waiting for an answer about how infinite incomprehensibility can lead to humans having enough specific knowledge about God to form organized religions. If we can always defer to this infinite incomprehensibility to resolve issues in the Bible where two mutually exclusive facts are asserted, how can we say we know anything at all about God?
2. This, I think, is the key to our disagreement. You say you “begin with the understanding in my worldview of an inerrant, God-breathed, Bible that is complete and infalliable”. Naturally, if you start out by assuming that the Bible is perfect and true, you’re going to find a way to believe everything in there. On the other hand, I am not starting out by assuming my conclusion. I am looking at the Bible and trying to figure out if it is something that makes enough sense to believe in. I don’t begin with “the presupposition that the Bible is not inerrant;” I read the Bible to see what is in it, and when I find things like “x is true” and “x is not true” I can conclude that the Bible is not inerrant. Essentially what you are arguing is, “Believe it, and then it will be easy to believe,” which is just never going to convince me.
3. “But it seems like what you’re saying is that you ARE, in fact, looking at the whole picture and that’s what’s confusing you – is that right?” Yes, exactly right. Your example here is a good illustration that God can test people without tempting them with sin. I don’t presume to know what all God’s tests look like, and I think I remember instances of people saying “God is testing me” as a recovering alcoholic who has to attend a party with lots of drinking and the like, but who knows. Even if I concede the “testing” point, I don’t think this proves that God never “tempts people to do evil” insofar as that means “encouraging people or even forcing them to do bad things.” See, for one very clear example, God hardening Pharaoh’s heart so that he would not let the Israelites out of Egypt. It was hardly Pharaoh’s choice to make this refusal. (Or, it was his choice, if you believe the small handful of other verses which say that Pharaoh hardened his own heart. And this is my point — which do you believe?)
4. Yes, I’m familiar with the notion of original sin, and I think it’s completely reprehensible and unjust. But I’m also familiar with the popular notion, regardless of sin, God is in charge of “how we are” in a general sense, that he crafted each person as an individual with their own strengths and challenges, that he knows what each of us need to experience in order to help us grow as individuals. See, for example, the book ‘Just the Way I Am: God’s Good Design in Disability’ by Krista Horning, or messages for children like this one. I imagine there is probably some or a few verses in the Letters that make a similar point, though off the top of my head I can’t quote any. Regardless — are we lying to little children in Sunday School? Has God actually not been able to make individual people special according to his desires since way back in Genesis 3?
5. You assume that God is sovereign and omnipotent, correct? Then if he chooses not to remove evil and sin from the world, he must not really want it gone (or there must be something he wants more than for evil and sin to be gone from the world). You write that God “allowed sin to enter into the world (for if He did not at least permit it then it could not be so)” — and this is exactly the point. This is why God is at least partly responsible for sin and evil. By choosing not to exercise his infinite powers, he chooses to allow evil in the world. It is still a choice, an action, a decision.
6. Fine, I think this point collapses into the others and we can drop this.
7. The link you gave me there seems to say that God does cause sin, but that because John Calvin said so, somehow that’s okay. There is a link back to the first post in that series, which quotes John Piper saying, “God is sovereign over Satan, and therefore Satan’s will does not move without God’s permission. And therefore every move of Satan is part of God’s overall purpose and plan.” Also, “God created [Satan and his demons] knowing what they would become and how, in that very evil role, they would glorify Christ.” And so on. Yes, they claim that God does not “author” sin, but this seems like a petty distinction at the point at which God “authored” the agent/s which he knew would go on to “author” sin. This sounds like a very clear case for God’s significant responsibility in this matter.
8. I’m sorry for using the royal “we,” I just meant to refer to the topics that I’d covered in a long post, the “we” being me and my readers processing my words in their minds. We’re in the process of discussing it now, and I argue that it is a fact. I agree that you should not be held responsible for every single person’s every single choice or every single instance of evil in the world, but for those which you have the immediate power to stop without incurring additional more severe harms, you do. What of God? Isn’t it true that “with God all things are possible”? Your omnipotent God must have the ability to stop all of these things — otherwise he is not omnipotent. Let’s assume both you and God offer to “help in every way [you] can” — the ways you can are obviously limited, but God’s are not! If God chooses not use his infinite abilities to achieve some goal, we have no other option but to conclude that God did not want to achieve that goal, because it cannot have been that he was unable.
NFQ
/ July 22, 2010 at 8:16 am@Wesley: I forgot to mention this from your second comment. You quote 1 Corinthians 10:13, and I think the pertinent clause there is “with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape.” The syntax here makes it clear that God provides two things: the temptation, and the way of escape. (He “also provides” something “with” something else, meaning he provided the something else too.) I agree that it is outrageous to imagine; you ask an excellent question when you say, “Would God be trying to help us escape something that He placed on us?” It does seem like a cruel and twisted game. But that’s not my problem to resolve, it’s yours.
By the way, you ask, “Did Nazi soldiers try and help Jews escape concentration camps?” The answer is yes, including some Nazi officers. You might be interested in reading about Karl Plagge or Wilm Hosenfeld, two examples among many.
@jpm:
I know that everybody loves to think that quantum mechanical “uncertainty” means that “we can’t really know anything!” and all that jazz. But it’s really not analogous. Light has ways in which it acts like a particle and ways in which it acts like a wave, but I could describe to you those ways and the circumstances under which they occur. In this discussion, I have not received an answer as to what things we can know for sure about God and what things we cannot. I was told that one way we can know about God is by studying his word as contained in the Bible, but when that word seems not to make sense — it must be that darn incomprehensibility again! Anything we think we know can be contradicted by something hypothetical we don’t know. Problem “solved.” I don’t understand how, in the face of infinite incomprehensibility, we have any basis to form organized religion and assert that God wants us to think and act in certain particular ways. If language is that imprecise, perhaps people should stop pretending that they are expressing truths about God using language.
If theism is “a necessary condition for any examination” of theism, you’re not really examining theism. You’re presuming your conclusion in order to derive it — as I told Wesley under my response to #2.
Atheists are not making a leap of faith by refraining from believing certain claims, assuming they do not claim complete certainty, which I do not. My claim is that I have seen no good reason to believe certain claims, while I do have good reason to see those claims as outlandish and not grounded in reality. If I find some evidence to change my mind, I will. But after repeated discussions like this one, I’m growing more and more certain that that evidence is not out there. After all, you are both telling me that I can only understand your religion to be true if I begin by assuming it to be true.
jpm
/ July 22, 2010 at 9:35 amNFQ,
Regardless of our philosophical differences we both use the human mind to reach our opposite conclusions. You “refrain” from believing certain theistic claims just as I refrain from believing certain materialistic claims. Math exists. But does it exist merely on a chalkboard, or does it pre-exist the chalkboard? Is the universe run by numbers?
An atheist might approach the numbers and say, “Look, there is no god, just the blind wheels of the universe churning”. A theist will say, “Look, there is a god, where did the math come from?” Both are making faith judgments based on the evidence.
It is half true that one can only believe something to be true if he begins to assume it is true. But there has to be good evidence before one can go stepping on unseen stones across that chasm. We’re not saying blind faith makes Christ evident, but we are saying that you can’t see clearly at first when you believe, but then it begins to come into focus. I respect your viewpoints because I am very skeptical by nature when it comes to religion. But I have disregarded certain skepticisms in order to believe. You can find a fly in the salad and ruin your whole meal, or you can eat around it. The cook didn’t put the fly in there. Such is theism. It does take a bit of faith to nibble around and see how it tastes, and then you dive in or push away from the table. Jesus told people to “follow me”, and many of them left after some point in time. Christianity is open for the ‘trying’ as it were. Imperfect knowledge of science has not inhibited your atheism, neither should it inhibit your theism should you choose to venture into that lane. Enjoyed the conversation.
NFQ
/ July 22, 2010 at 12:59 pm@jpm: I’m not sure if closing your comment with, “Enjoyed the conversation,” means that you are done here. I’ve enjoyed this conversation too, so thanks for your input, if you were saying goodbye. In case you are not done …
Making a statement that includes caveats like, “probably,” “most likely,” or “to the best of my knowledge” is not the same thing as having faith. Making an inference, as you say, “based on the evidence” is not the same thing as having faith. Using our minds to reach conclusions is not the same thing as having faith. It seems to me that you are using the word “faith” in a way totally unlike virtually all other speakers of English.
I also do not support atheists using the existence of mathematics as conclusive proof that there is no God. I have never read or heard any atheist actually arguing that, but I just thought I should make that clear.
I guess I think of my questions here as my nibble around Christianity. I think it would be strange to do what you describe and essentially declare Christianity delicious, and then dig in and see how I like the taste. That’s much more than just a nibble! My question to you: how do you just eat around the fly in the salad that is Christianity, when part of Christianity is the claim that there are absolutely no flies at all in this perfect salad?
Rek
/ July 22, 2010 at 1:06 pm@jpm,
You write:
Math exists. But does it exist merely on a chalkboard, or does it pre-exist the chalkboard? Is the universe run by numbers?
An atheist might approach the numbers and say, “Look, there is no god, just the blind wheels of the universe churning”. A theist will say, “Look, there is a god, where did the math come from?” Both are making faith judgments based on the evidence.
Obviously math pre-dates chalkboards, but to say that math “exists” is a rather specious claim. Math does not “exist” any more than logic or causation “exists”. All three–math, logic, causation–as well as other things, like morality, are how we perceive and interact with the world. Math and logic are the structure of conscious thought, and it is through these structures that we then evaluate the world and make truth claims. This is not an atheistic point, as the very Christian philosopher Kant expended quite a bit of energy in the First Critique to outline this reality. Thus, that we have math says nothing about anything when it comes to god.
There is no faith judgment in “just the blind wheels of the universe turning”. It is merely the observation that things are happening in the universe. There is no reason to posit a “god” behind any of it. If you want to add god to the mix, you must first explain what you mean by the term and then explain how you get it from the evidence. Otherwise, it is just a blind leap of faith. The atheist has no equivalent.
In re: the rest of your comment, I will say that I tried Christianity for most of my youth and found it utterly unappealing. After many years of misery, guilt, and needless conflict, I am now an atheist, have been so for three years, and have never been happier and at peace with myself and the world. Obviously everyone’s story is different, but the idea that Christianity is best or right for everyone is patently false and absurd.
jpm
/ July 22, 2010 at 2:30 pmNFQ,
Not saying I am done with the conversation, just a polite way to end it without being abrupt, or to imply that I’ve settled it sufficiently, but instead looking forward to the continued discussion.
Faith is not a blind leap for a Christian. I am not using it unlike any other person might say “I have faith in that employee”, or “he is a faithful dog to his owner”. It may be an uncommon English construction, but in Hebrew and Greek I am in the etymological realm of the word. Faith is trust in the Christian sense, and though others might use it in a more mystical, less rational way, I am not trying to use it in an irrational way, though I am not a rationalist.
Everyone starts with faith. There is some solid lump of “being” that is assumed by anybody who ever interacts with reality in a philosophical way. Whether that is the cold, hard cosmos, or whether it is the god of a particular faith (used as a noun) to which one assents.
I realize one cannot declare something delicious without tasting it. Nibbling? Perhaps you are reading the ingredients on the label but that was just a metaphor to say if you are looking for a doubtless Christianity (no flies in the food) you will not find it. The human mind can doubt the color of red. But some Christians still eat, even with flies (doubts) in their food, and it does not derail them. I don’t understand all of science, therefore I do not discount all of it. I don’t understand all of Christianity, but of course that does not stop me from trying to bend the rest of my life to it. I realize I speak as a Christian, however, and not as a skeptic. Were God to not exist, however, I have still dwelt completely in the sane confines of reality, happily, and with betterment to the world because of it. If God does exist, happiest am I. It is philosophically pleasing.
But if it has no attachment to probable reality, faith will not carry me past that hurdle, I could not believe it. I am not a rationalist, but I am not irrational.
jpm
/ July 22, 2010 at 2:43 pmRek,
Can I at arm’s length examine the world from atheism? I can entertain the notions, and they are completely unpalatable from a reasonable perspective. Just as Christianity must appear to some atheists. Yet reason is a whore, as a theologian once said, and goes with whatever drive pays her the highest. So we take her claims lightly.
But about math…it is incoherent to say that logic and non-contradiction are merely categories of human thought and not in the very metaphysical structure of the universe. If it were not, one could circumvent the phenomenal and just interact with the noumenal on some level. If the mind makes them up, disengage the mind and things should continue to work. That’s not usually the case we find in science or in experience. Kant was culturally a Christian only, his philosophy was very panentheistic.
For math and logic to be merely the constuct of conscious thought precludes that conscious thought is bigger than any one consciousness’ thoughts, since math and logic bind all rational thought. That’s like saying all fish swim in the water of their own perception. Plus, if there is no law of non-contradiction, then it is perfectly acceptable to say God exists and no he doesn’t. Why play the game as an atheist? If in the blind universe there is no difference, why take a side in an attempt to better line up with reality? If there is no logic in the universe, all things exist and no things exist. Do you know why Buddhist study Kant? Because they realize the implication of his theory lends itself to their worldview of maya (illusion). In an atmosphere like that, why are atheists trying to find meaning when it is just an illusion too?
Rek
/ July 22, 2010 at 5:04 pmjpm,
What I mean to say is that math and logic are not fundamental to the world but to how we perceive and understand the world. Hume demonstrated long ago how both causation and morality do not exist absent the observer. Yet, we necessarily feel them to be true and cannot do otherwise. This is my point; math does not “exist” in the world. It is the way that the human mind understands the world. Perhaps on some other world, another sentient race has an entirely different cognitive apparatus and understands the world in a fundamentally different way than we do. This does not make either apparatus “wrong” in any meaningful sense because the tools of evaluation–in our case math and logic–are not themselves part of the world (and are, in any case, necessarily circular). Indeed, our hypothetical sentient race would regrettably and by definition not be able to communicate with us at all. (This, as an aside, is why all agree that any personal god must be bound by the rules of logic, otherwise humans would literally not be able to understand or say anything about that god.)
NFQ
/ July 23, 2010 at 2:14 am@jpm: All right, we do use the phrases “have faith in” or “to be faithful to” in the sense of loyalty, trust, and obedience. I still contend that most religious people also include in their notion of “faith” the fact that they believe without regard to the evidence. At any rate, none of these senses of faith describe the way that atheists relate to the concept of a lack of God or gods. I do not trust the-lack-of-God the way I might trust an employee, nor am I obedient and loyal to the-lack-of-God the way a dog obeys and is loyal to its owner.
You might say that I have faith that my experiences are a way to determine facts about reality, or that I have faith that logical inference is a good way to develop knowledge about reality — but even then I would not quite call it “faith.” I recognize the weaknesses in these things, and I resort to them as essentially the best options we have, even though they are not perfect. I don’t know how anyone could function if they did not make the basic assumption that the things they saw with their eyes were actually there, etc. — just imagine the number of ways you could get yourself killed going through life like that. Still, “it’s the best we can do, I suppose” is not really something I would call “faith.”
Two main questions:
1. In your judgment, what would I have to do for you to determine I am really taking this metaphorical “nibble” of Christianity (rather than just “reading the ingredients”), given that studying Christianity’s holy scriptures is not enough?
2. You wrote, “But if [God/Christianity?] has no attachment to probable reality, faith will not carry me past that hurdle, I could not believe it.” I assume you are implying that you currently believe your religion does have some attachment to probable reality. Could you elaborate on what parts of it you find probable, and why?
jpm
/ July 23, 2010 at 10:49 amNFQ,
Very nice response, I think we agree there is a sense in which “trust/faith/pisteuo/aman” differs in the biblical sense from “intuitive feeling without regard to faculties”. This modern notion that faith is a leap in the dark, arational, is a very eastern concept. It does not have strong roots in Western thought or classical Christianity. (This is all beside the point, but it is very common today because many Christians are anti-intellectual, it’s a problem we deal with in the church). But you ask what parts of theism are to me probable…
# 2 first…
This is brief and not exhaustive, and limited to why there is a god.
1. Something is, in an ultimate sense. It merely is.
2. This something that is….proves itself to us in the act of examination and experience.
3. Even if it is illusion, the act of examination still stands the test of ‘being’, so something is, even if it is only the fact that I exist in my examination of reality.
4. Since we know that something is, and is examinable, we realize something is different than nothing.
5. If there is something, ‘nothing’ cannot ever be an explanation for it.
6. There is therefore something that is an explanation for it.
7. That something, must either have something else for an explanation, or it must break rule #5 and have ‘nothing’ for its explanation of origin.
Therefore: either this universe has nothing to explain its existence, or it has something which has nothing for its explanation.
There must either be an uncaused universe in existence (i.e. it is god).
Or there must be an uncaused cause (i.e. a god, or being outside of the cause and effect loop).
Or there must be an infinite chain of causes that caused this universe. This option is not possible, because an infinite regression is illogical, if you walk half way to infinity you will never get there. The universe would have never gotten to this point in time, since infinity is timeless.
Some have speculated that the universe came from a type of reality in which cause and effect was not a real component, and ‘slid’ into the cause and effect loop, but if that doesn’t take faith I don’t know what does.
You can come up with a plethora of answers for what #7 is, and it often won’t lead one exclusively to Christianity. But as a Christian, it is one of many reasons I see a logical necessity for a god. Now why the Christian God? That is subjective. I have submitted myself to that religion for reasons outside of this argument. But I will say in each of the major religions, there are philosophical differences of origin. Buddhism says science is illusion. Hinduism says the same. Islam has no philosophical basis to deal with other fundamental concepts, though it does deal with the physical world in an actual way. Only the Judeo-Christian worldview deals with the creation as a non-mythical, real entity that maintains the creator-creation distinction necessary for science to be real and meaningful, and the metaphysical-moral realm to be real and meaningful. The truth is, science can never disprove metaphysics, and metaphysics needs science to make sense. In Christianity you have a blend of those two that makes meaningful interaction with society and the world possible. That is not exhaustive nor logically incongruent with other options, but it would take a book to flesh it all out. Each one of the numbers 1-7 above has been wrestled with before, but there are all good explanations why each of them stands.
jpm
/ July 23, 2010 at 11:52 am#1: nibbling and reading, or whatever analogy…
I think, but don’t know, that you are a practicing atheist. By practicing, I mean you are looking for breaks in the Bible, rather than fixes. I could be wrong, you might be an atheist just because you have no better option for the moment.
About nibbling: The atrocities of communism never keep an atheist from being and atheist, because they are philosophically committed to atheism. Just like the Crusades never keep a Christian from being a Christian, because they are philosophically committed to Christianity. Both groups just say, “the worst does not define us, judge us by our best”.
Not understanding how parts of the Bible coalesce into unity, should not keep a person from being a Christian, just like there being no objective basis for morality or meaning shouldn’t keep an atheist from having good friendships. Studying the Bible to look at the seeming holes is not nibbling. Yes Christians believe it is historical, yes Christians believe it is actual, but none of us were driven to worship Henry the VIII just because he could be proven from history. Within the history, within the events, there is a metaphysical tug towards admiration for Christ. In that admiration springs up a growing sense of need for a mediator between God and yourself. That’s why Scripture is always painting God as wrathful, it’s like a cancer diagnosis that looks really bad so that you’ll take what seems to be poison to cure it. Christ talks about dying to oneself. Christ talks about giving up personal rights in conflict in order to make peace. Is that really what we want? Only if we realize cancerous sin runs our lives, do we agree to such harsh medicines. But the person of Jesus Christ, his attributes and God-ness make it palatable. That is how one becomes a Christian, and though the philosophical approach might lead one there, the metaphysical aspects of sin, guilty, and the attraction of glory in Christ lead a person to eat from the table.
This is highly subjective, prone to controversy, and not the way it happens to everyone, but it is the root of most experience in the faith. And is why I made a distinction between nibbling and examination. You are dealing with the Bible on reality..good. “Is it real?” But are you dealing with the Bible on a different level too… “Do I need this?” Both are necessary, but one is vital.
jpm
/ July 23, 2010 at 12:03 pmRek,
There has never been anything observable, that anyone could ascertain whether or not it existed without observation. But a blind mouse can still be eaten by a cat. What I mean is, before we analyzed the universe via the scientific method, people still died from the unknown laws of physics. The universe shows distinct evidence that the laws of physics were in operation before humanity could postulate their workings. Hume was wrong in this instance. What you mean by math, i.e. quantification is true. The quantification we use does not exist without observation. But the measurable and quantifiable laws do. Just because nobody is out counting volts doesn’t mean nature plays dice with lightning. There are organizing principles that allow the universe to be examined by rational minds. The rationality, exists before the mind observes it, and rationally measures it. That is what I mean by math exists before the chalkboard. The force of atoms pulling on one another is the same, regardless of which sentient race has quantified it #s of AFM and which one has called it something else, or even qualitatively described it.
Rek
/ July 23, 2010 at 12:15 pmjpm,
I think your criticisms of the other major faith traditions would not necessarily be shared by the adherents of that other system. I would imagine that a Muslim would claim for Islam all that you claim for Judeo-Christianity. Indeed, given that we owe all of our scientific, mathematical (including our number system), and philosophical prowess to the Islamic world, they have quite a leg to stand on. After all, we would have nothing from the classical world if the Islamic East had not maintained its copies of Plato, Aristotle, et al while the Christian West burned it all. But, you did add the caveat that your justification for believing in Christianity is subjective, so I will not belabor the point.
As for the universe, physicists have actually demonstrated that the universe could have come from nothing. Actually, of all the infinite theoretical universes one can imagine, there is only one type of universe–a “flat” universe–that has zero total energy and thus could have come from nothing. Our universe is just such a universe. So, ironically, our universe is curiously fine tuned in the only configuration that allows it not to need a prior cause beyond empty space (which, of course, is nothing). Empty space, of course, is timeless, eternal, and uncaused. Unless your metaphysics allows for empty space to be called god, I would suggest that you refine what you mean by “a logical necessity for a god”.
For a somewhat lengthy but poignant explanation of the proof and implications of our flat universe, look here
It’s about an hour long, but you can skip to 32:00 min and watch through the end (or at the very least until about 46min) for the relevant part about quantum mechanics.
As to your point about “the worst does not define us, judge us by our best”, this has been said a thousand times before and will be said countless times again: communism says nothing about atheism. Communism followed from modernism–this is a fair claim–but modernism infected the minds of the religious and the non-religious alike. The same teleological thinking that inspired the Crusades and the Inquisition inspired the ravages of 20th century totalitarianism. The common factor is a commitment to an absolute truth (God, racial utopia, egalitarian workers’ paradise, etc.) that matters more than people. Religion–at least mainstream contemporary monotheism–is fundamentally teleological in this way, as is evident when religions claim “anyone who doesn’t believe is going to hell”. The secular teleological systems–Stalinism, Nazism, etc–just replace “God” with something else as the source of meaning above “people are valuable in themselves”–i.e., modernism. It says nothing about atheism per se, but it says plenty about teleological morality and government.
Rek
/ July 23, 2010 at 12:34 pmjpm,
In re: your point about math and reality, you wrote:
There has never been anything observable, that anyone could ascertain whether or not it existed without observation[...]What I mean is, before we analyzed the universe via the scientific method, people still died from the unknown laws of physics. The universe shows distinct evidence that the laws of physics were in operation before humanity could postulate their workings. Hume was wrong in this instance. What you mean by math, i.e. quantification is true. The quantification we use does not exist without observation. But the measurable and quantifiable laws do.
Your objection begs the question. Individuals, who have a certain type of cognitive apparatus, understand themselves to be effected by things that can be understood via that apparatus. A blind man can say, “Damn, I’m blind. Damn, I’ve been eaten. My life really sucks right now.” A carrot cannot. Thus, to say “The carrot was eaten by the whatever” requires and presupposes an observer. You can’t talk about a hypothetical world without observers because in so doing you are already presupposing an observer and thus begging the question. This line we can’t get behind–a world with observers–is where math, logic, and causation are. We literally and of necessity cannot conceive of a world without these things, but these things nonetheless only exist because we are observing them to exist because they are the structures of our cognitive apparati. Any thought experiment you imagine to challenge this point will, as you’ll see, presuppose the existence of these things, which you will still not find anywhere in the world. Where on earth is “math” located? Where is “causality” in the world? This is Hume’s point, and I don’t see how you’ve refuted it.
jpm
/ July 23, 2010 at 7:52 pmJust a quick one, if you read up on mathematics you will find that the Muslims got their basis in mathematics from Indian civilizations. The reason math could flourish in the Islamic world was that it was abstract and was not subject to claims of idolatry like painting and sculpting would be. I can cite some sources for you if you want. The fact that they kept Aristotle was also owing more to the fact that they had Greek-speaking subject peoples living in their realms of influence, and that they took over Byzantium where many manuscripts were located. But there were persecutions against philosophers who took Aristotle over the Koran. If you’ll also notice, when Islam absorbed Aristotle, it was in a rigid and hard sense, there was no modification of it like there was in the West with the scholastics like Anselm, Aquinas, etc. This is not to cast Islam in a bad light at the expense of Christianity, I am just citing some information that isn’t commonly perused.
jpm
/ July 24, 2010 at 12:01 amRek,
I hope this doesn’t come off in a disparaging tone, I enjoy the discussion, I am not meaning to be a jerk or a pedagogue.
Your whole point about Hume, and the flat universe, perfectly exemplifies what I am saying: you used the word “finely tuned”, be it a figure of speech, it perfectly shows what I mean. There is no free lunch, if something is finely tuned, or perfectly attenuated, to exist as it is there were preexisting conditions that this begs for. Obviously, physicists differ and are no common agreement as to the origins of the universe. To quote one, and say the matter is settled is like saying the universe is finely tuned (like a piano) without noticing it takes a tuner to do so. Finely tuned to what, life? Your assumption is that this was purposelessly, randomly done. My assumption is that a purposeful, logical entity did so. You assume without examination that cause and effect would not exist. I assume such examination exists outside of the loop of cause and effect by an outside entity. You borrow logic, however, and borrow math, to disprove the necessities of such things. Hume fails to explain how cause and effect can be violated, because he uses cause and effect logic to do so. This hypothetical world that Hume, and your physicists created, is hypothetical and theoretical. Obviously there are no notes left by the universe as to how it came to be, and the small fraction we inhabit does not lend itself to such certain assumptions to be made without error. If atheists can create hypothetical narratives to explain origins, so can theists. But you play by the theists rules to get there.
The theory that empty space is timeless, eternal and uncaused is pure conjecture. No physicist has been able to examine empty space in a timeless, eternal, uncaused manner has he? All these things are passed off as mere statements of fact when they are just as much creeds of belief as the Tri-unity of God to Christians. Prove that the law of non-contradiction doesn’t exist. How could you? Prove there is no cause and effect. Me presupposing an observer is no different than Hume presupposing no observer. We are both in the same trade here…I call it god you called it not-god, but we are both metaphysicians.
Rek
/ July 24, 2010 at 11:13 amjpm,
You misunderstood me. I used “finely tuned” jocularly to poke fun at the theistic notion that the universe is “finely tuned” to support life and thus is most probably the creation of a sentient god. I don’t actually believe the universe is finely tuned at all–it’s probably just the result of the quantum fluctuations that necessarily occur in nothingness. I am not claiming that scientists have conclusively figured out exactly how our universe came about. Rather, I am saying that there is absolutely no need whatsoever for any kind of deity to explain everything that exists. Quantum mechanics has shown that the idea of god is utterly unnecessary, and you can get this entire world without there being anything out there “beyond” the universe. You are still free to believe in god if you wish, no one is stopping you, but there is no sufficient reason to do so. Everything can be explained without it.
You still seem to be misunderstanding my point about cause and effect. To my knowledge, it is not a controversial one: if you look at the world as basically as possible, you will not be able to find morality anywhere. Look at a man killing someone and tell me where exactly the immorality is. You can’t because it is imposed on the system by the observer. Similarly, throw a rock at a window (assuming the window shatters), and tell me at what precise moment causation enters the picture. Where exactly is this causation? The objective observer describing only what he sees will see a rock hit a window and glass breaking and shattering away from the rock. The basic observation is: the rock hit the window and the window broke. That’s it. That’s all that is in the world. It is the human observer who adds that the: the rock hit the window and caused the window to break. Just as with morality, the human mind imposes its structure upon the world it observes. Still, as even the mind can see when it focuses on basic observation, that structure exists in the mind, not in the world. To say this is not to say that we can observe violations of causation, only that we cannot derive causation from mere observation. It is a starting premise of our observing the world, not something we get from the world. But again, this is not a bad thing, nor do I know that any philosophers reject this Humean observation. It is simply how we understand reality. It is not problematic unless you are trying to claim it says anything about god (beyond that an intelligible one must operate in ways comprehensible to our cognitive apparatus–i.e., logic, causation, etc.).
This statement: The theory that empty space is timeless, eternal and uncaused is pure conjecture. is quite meaningless. Empty space–being quite literally nothing–necessarily preceded the universe (i.e. the totality of things that exist). When you or anyone else asks the question, “How can something come from nothing?” you are already conceding this point. Anything that precedes space-time (i.e. everything) is necessarily and by definition “timeless, eternal, and uncaused”. This is a point you theists fall back on when you implore the cosmological argument, so I don’t see what ground you have to object. Empty space simply is. Or it is not. Both are true because we are literally talking about nothingness. How nothing can be–or need be–”caused” is beyond me.
jpm
/ July 25, 2010 at 12:32 pmNothing is not the problem we are trying to explain as theists, it is the ‘something’ that proceeds from the apparent nothing. If it is truly nothing, then we are left with nothing. As it is we are left with something that warrants and explanation.
Cause and effect is not “pasted” on a breaking window, it is derived from the breaking window. Windows don’t just break from causeless conditions. If they did we could question cause and effect. I really think you are confused on this point.
And the whole label of quantum mechanics…I love the sound of it…because it begs for a mechanic. Just because a physicist CAN describe how the universe might have causelessly (which is such a funny concept) come into existence, does not mean he HAS described what happened. We are still dealing with probability. I still don’t think you realize you are borrowing theistic tools to carve God out of the equation. You are practicing as rigid an adherence to your metanarrative as I do to my theistic one. Empty space is not energy. There now exists a massive amount of energy. ? Try to envision a situation in which this could occur in our universe…you might be able to, but just because you can, does not mean it works that way.
I assume your life runs by the basic laws of the universe, and that you never awaken to find your car dented without wondering who did it. You don’t say, “cause and effect is not valid here”. Yet with the ultimate question of where the universe came from, you aren’t even looking for an insurance card on the windshield?
jpm
/ July 25, 2010 at 12:48 pmRek,
btw I was just perusing through one of my books on philosophy to brush up on Hume (it’s been a few years) and came across this line: “there are three common misconceptions about Hume’s philosophy….(1) Hume denied the reality of causal relations…Hume had no qualms with these beliefs…Hume showed that reason and expience is a sufficient ground for knowledge of these matters” Hume was proving the weakness of empiricism in his critiques of cause and effect, not disproving cause and effect. Jogged my memory.
jpm
/ July 25, 2010 at 12:55 pmI’ll also let Hume speak: “The whole frame of nature bespeaks an intelligent author, and no rational enquirer can, after serious reflection, suspend his belief a moment with regard to the primary principles of genuine theism and Religion.” Natural History of Religion (in the Philosophical Works of David Hume) (London, 1874-1875), 4, 309.
Rek
/ July 25, 2010 at 3:18 pmjpm,
I think we are talking past one another in rather pointless circles in re: causation, so I’ll drop it. After all, nothing depends on the point; it is purely academic, so there’s no point in beating it to death. I will thus sum up my stance: causation is how we interpret certain sequences of events. This does not mean it is not real, but it does mean that such a concept presupposes an observer. Again, if you disagree, let’s just drop it.
I am not arguing that physics has proven conclusively that the universe came from nothing. I am only arguing that our flat universe–which has zero total energy (including the 70% of it that is dark energy) could have easily from nothing. Causation breaks down in quantum mechanics, which is why particles pop into and out of existence uncaused all the time. Thus, god is quite unnecessary. There may be creators of this universe, but at the end of the regress is either nothingness–from which flat universes can emerge–or an infinite, eternal metaverse. I don’t see what probability has to do with it. In quantum mechanics, nothing always yields something. So your point about “truly nothing” is, according to physicists, misinformed, albeit quite intuitive. That’s just the apparent nature of nothing. It may sound contrary to intuition, but then again, so is a whole lot of other things in physics–e.g. that time is relative (and so two events can occur simultaneously while also occurring one after the other–an apparent contradiction but nonetheless demonstrably true). Lest I give the impression that I am claiming to understand more than I do, I will say that I have learned that when it comes to concepts and events at the quantum level, our intuition is more a liability than a guide to truth. In many cases–e.g. that there is an absolute time, or that something cannot come from nothing, or that empty space cannot bend or have energy–our intuition is just wrong.
I’m not really sure what about my “metanarrative” is “rigid”, or what point you are attempting to make with that characterization. I also don’t need anything from theism, so if you think I am unfairly relying on ungrounded concepts or contradicting myself, please point out the specific instances and refute them accordingly. I assume you mean to imply that I am being dogmatic or that I am clinging to a worldview no more grounded than yours. If this is your position, you are mistaken. I am only pointing out the objective fact that god is not necessary to explain the universe. I am not positing anything except what prominent physicists have proven via experiment. There is no sound basis for claiming that some sentient or personal intelligence created the universe, so to assert such a thing, you are either positing a claim that stands on evidence as yet unknown to me or you are making a claim without evidence (a leap of faith, I suppose) that I necessarily have no reason to accept (and thus don’t).
I have heard many theists use some variant of the “You never assume anything else is uncaused so why do you not apply this standard to the universe.” It is functionally a vernacular permutation of the Kalan Cosmological Argument: 1) everything that begins to exist has a cause. 2) the universe began to exist. Conclusion) the universe has a cause. As I have heretofore argued, premise 1 doesn’t actually hold at the quantum level where things like “the beginning of the universe” operate. Everyday occurrences are simply not analogous.
To conclude, I sincerely hope I have not come off as hostile in any way. I realize that there is a tendency for atheists and theists to regard the other (if only implicitly) as delusional or intellectually impaired. I try very hard to combat this tendency, and I would like to think I am succeeding. For the record, I find your tone quite amiable and am enjoying our conversation. I look forward to your response.
jpm
/ July 26, 2010 at 9:27 amYou have not come off in a hostile manner, this whole discussion has been very nice and enjoyable. Please let me have a day or two to consider the sum of your response, as it does involve things I am not as well read on as you. Thank you.
jpm
/ July 26, 2010 at 8:53 pmRek,
I think it stands here, and won’t move past this point:
You believe quantum mechanics *can* explain a possible origin of the universe that has no need of a necessary cause. A flat universe *can* come into existence from nothing, or so you claim. It doesn’t necessarily follow, however, that just because such a universe *can* come into existence without a god, that it *does* come into existence as such. Plus, demonstrating limited knowledge, as all of us have, we are left with probability and necessity as the weak point in the existence of god. God is not necessary in such a universe, that probably exists in such a scheme as we might call a flat universe.
My only qualm with the bounds of your argument is that even if a god is not necessary, it does not follow that such a being is definitely not there. Which as philosophical arguments go, that is where your and my presuppositions vary, and play the greatest role in our divergent theistic positions. I say even if there were a flat universe, the preconditions (or lack thereof) must always regress back to another precondition that eventually explains itself. You will say there can possibly be conceived a state of conditions that need no precondition. I cannot disprove you, only contradict the possibility of that based on logic. You might say logic is not valid. At which point I would accuse you of using theistic tools to dismantle my argument (logic). We are at an impasse as far as I know, albeit a good conversational one. It’s a shame these conversations must take place on blogs, these are the talks that good cigars get burnt over. If I’ve missed anything, sorry, I will have to read up on quantum mechanics a bit more, and then I’ll get up with you. Do you have your own site?
Rek
/ July 27, 2010 at 2:17 pmWesley,
It seems we have indeed reached an impasse, as must always be the case (in lieu of persuasion) when people with different premises enter into discussion. Nevertheless, I also very much enjoyed this conversation, and I heartily agree that “these are the talks that good cigars get burnt over”. I have indeed burnt many a cigar in some fantastic discussions in the last couple years of college. I do have my own blogger profile (which you can reach by clicking on my name in this post), but I do not yet have an active blog to discuss these matters. I suppose I should do something about that soon. I will certainly let you know.
In the meantime, take care. I will pause a moment to reflect on all this when I enjoy my next cigar.
jpm
/ July 27, 2010 at 10:18 pmWhat will you be enjoying? I’ve got an Opus X super belicoso that has philosophy written all over it.
Kyle
/ July 23, 2011 at 1:57 amAll atheists are stoked full of lies in their hearts like a kettle full of boiling water that’s about to explode.
Bye.