A Wider case for God - Peter Williams has made this book of his available free online at his website. Look in the book section; under free books.
Quotes and comments;
1. 'Kai Nielsen has argued that: "for somebody living in the twentieth century with a good philosophical and a good scientific education, who thinks carefully about the matter. . . it is irrational to believe in God."
- I can't see that a materialist has any sound basis for calling anything irrational. Materialism is the denial of mind and therefore of reason. It's therefore intellectual fraud for materialists to call belief in god irrational. Nothing could be either rational or irrational if materialism were true.
2. 'Christian Philosophers such as Alvin Plantinga... have argued that belief in God can be ‘basic’ in the same way that trust in the general reliability of our memory and other cognitive systems is ‘basic.’
- If it's forumuated correctly I believe this argument has merit; ie. "since man is made by god to live in god's world it is reasonable to assume that if a sane person believes x to be true, there is warrant to think it actually is true."
- Richard Dawkins? has mocked this idea with one of his ridiculous examples (he's the king of bad illustrations) something like; "If I believe in pink elephants, that means they exist." (He used a more absurd example.) He utterly fails to understand the argument. (what's new?) The argument stipulates a person believe x to be true. Dawkins doesn't believe his illustration is true. He's so used to lying he apparently gets confused when asked for a true belief :-)
- the argument comes in 2 version; the generic and the christian. (I don't think the generic version works.) Certainly Dawkins has no reason to believe that even his true beliefs are valid; ie. since he believes he's an automaton being manipulated by 'selfish' genes. Of course the question with dawkins is always; "is he really this clueless or is he only pretending to be." In any event, in an intellectual debate one has a right to take people at their word. There are certain risks in adopting the rhetorical strategy of pretended ignorance. Some people think he's faking it, while I think he truly is grossly ignorant of philosophy; unable to follow simple arguments. In fact I'd say that what Richard Dawkins knows about philosoophy you could write with a crayon on the back of Paley's watch.
Quotes and comments;
1. 'Kai Nielsen has argued that: "for somebody living in the twentieth century with a good philosophical and a good scientific education, who thinks carefully about the matter. . . it is irrational to believe in God."
- I can't see that a materialist has any sound basis for calling anything irrational. Materialism is the denial of mind and therefore of reason. It's therefore intellectual fraud for materialists to call belief in god irrational. Nothing could be either rational or irrational if materialism were true.
2. 'Christian Philosophers such as Alvin Plantinga... have argued that belief in God can be ‘basic’ in the same way that trust in the general reliability of our memory and other cognitive systems is ‘basic.’
- If it's forumuated correctly I believe this argument has merit; ie. "since man is made by god to live in god's world it is reasonable to assume that if a sane person believes x to be true, there is warrant to think it actually is true."
- Richard Dawkins? has mocked this idea with one of his ridiculous examples (he's the king of bad illustrations) something like; "If I believe in pink elephants, that means they exist." (He used a more absurd example.) He utterly fails to understand the argument. (what's new?) The argument stipulates a person believe x to be true. Dawkins doesn't believe his illustration is true. He's so used to lying he apparently gets confused when asked for a true belief :-)
- the argument comes in 2 version; the generic and the christian. (I don't think the generic version works.) Certainly Dawkins has no reason to believe that even his true beliefs are valid; ie. since he believes he's an automaton being manipulated by 'selfish' genes. Of course the question with dawkins is always; "is he really this clueless or is he only pretending to be." In any event, in an intellectual debate one has a right to take people at their word. There are certain risks in adopting the rhetorical strategy of pretended ignorance. Some people think he's faking it, while I think he truly is grossly ignorant of philosophy; unable to follow simple arguments. In fact I'd say that what Richard Dawkins knows about philosoophy you could write with a crayon on the back of Paley's watch.
Labels: Christianity
posted by M. Johnson at 8:31 AM
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