Can you prove it?

Some people want proof that the Christian view corresponds to reality… What type of proof would be valid?

If you mean evidence from laboratory experiments, what science consistently shows is that:

• We have no experimental evidence that something comes from nothing.
• We have no experimental evidence that life arises from non-life (abiogenesis remains unproven).
• We have no experimental evidence that highly complex systems arise spontaneously from simplicity without guidance.
• We have no experimental evidence that sustained order naturally emerges from total chaos without external input.

All known experimental evidence points in the opposite direction.

If you want proof from logic, we can reason that:

• If the human mind is purely the product of blind chance and undirected evolution, then we have no ultimate reason to trust our conclusions as reliable indicators of truth (a point made by thinkers like Alvin Plantinga).
• If there is no meaning or purpose to anything, then debate, opinions, or moral judgments ultimately have no binding significance.
• If we operate only from what the human mind can perceive or reason, then there is no ultimate guarantee that our thoughts correspond to reality (thus the need for divine revelation paired with human investigation).

If you mean proof from history, scholars widely agree that:

• The Bible provides an accurate historical record of events, geography, cultures, languages and archeological data, aligning with other authoritative records. The evidence shows it is deeply rooted in real history, contrary to the claim that it is merely myth.
• Jesus of Nazareth was a real historical person.
• He was crucified under the Roman governor Pontius Pilate in the first century.
• His earliest followers were utterly convinced he rose from the dead, providing strong evidence of his claims, and many endured persecution and death because of this belief.
• The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus and the Bible (his story) have had an unparalleled influence on global history, shaping law, justice, science, philosophy, art, literature, education, healthcare, and more.

Taken seriously, these historical points provide a foundation for the Christian claim that Jesus is God, arguing also for the Bible’s trustworthiness and thus its thesis statement: “In the beginning, God created…”

When applied to questions of ultimate origins, evolutionary theory functions more as a belief system than as observable science. Microevolution (small changes within species) is well-documented, but questions remain about how entirely new kinds of life (macroevolution) arise and how life itself began. Similarly, beliefs such as “matter is eternal” or “the multiverse exists” cannot be proven; they are philosophical extrapolations from a belief system. Many leading atheists admit their position begins with a prior commitment against God. Believing in eternal matter is no less a leap of faith than believing in creation ex nihilo.

On the other hand, design is evident everywhere in the universe. Intelligence gives order, meaning, and purpose—matter alone cannot. At every level, even down to the cell, life is built on information. The genetic code, for instance, is not just biological—it is linguistic. Richard Dawkins, though an atheist, acknowledges that DNA functions like a code: “What lies at the heart of every living thing is not a fire, not warm breath, nor a ‘spark of life’. It is information, words, instructions...” At the heart of biblical creation is not merely matter, but the spoken word. “And God said…” introduces a universe built through divine speech—through information, intention, and order.

Come and Drink

I meant to post this back in May during the season of graduations... It is a joy to celebrate these accomplishments, especially when we look back at how each one has grown in many ways. But it also makes us wonder what God has next for them and where they will invest their life and the blessings God has given them. What is worth our time and energy? What are the goals, desires and commitments that drive us and motivate us? How will we be successful and how do we even define success? I'm thinking even more about these questions and the process of transition as our oldest son moves through his Senior year of high school and considers moving to the US for college.

These are the questions that set the course of our life and either provide a stable foundation or an endless search for identity and purpose. Education can contribute positively to this in many ways:

1. A good education is one that points us to the glory of God. The glory of God is seen all around us in creation. We enjoy beauty, design, contrast, emotion, relationships, creativity, order and so much more because of who God is, how He created the world and how He has enabled us to understand and appreciate it.
2. A good education is one that models and teaches us humility. Our place in God's world is that of stewardship, not ownership. This means we do not have all the answers but work as His agents to restore, to care for, to guide, to forgive, to heal as an extension of God's character and activity. 
3. A good education is one that identifies the source of our problems. Conflict continues to escalate all around us. How is this possible when we have so much knowledge, wealth and power available to us? We must address the basic problem of humanity which is the sin condition of my own heart.
4. A good education is one that recognizes and implements the only real solution. Our search for happiness and comfort leads often to anxiety and distress. Our preoccupation with wealth and position leaves many lonely and empty. Through repentance and faith in Christ we abandon our self-will and self-worship in a restored relationship with our Creator and Redeemer who is the source of life. That is Good News!

 

Christian school leaders and Christian school teachers, while being responsible to teach Christianly, are also in the process of growth and learning themselves. We remind ourselves of the real source of our problems each day, our own sin. We remind ourselves of the actual solution each day, a surrender and a commitment to Christ and His purposes in the world. The hope of Christ-centered education is not in education as the solution, but rather in Christ as the solution and in education as a process to knowing Him and engaging effectively in His world.

I'm reminded of Christ's words in John 7:37-38.

"If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, 'From his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water.'"

We will never be satisfied with education that does not lead us to Christ. He is the only One who can satisfy our longing and actually provide for our most desperate and deepest need.

Understanding reality

Many of the observations in Ecclesiastes are related to work. We might even say that Solomon is investigating the significance of our work on earth. This is highlighted by the repeated phrase "under the sun". If you want more on this topic and an interesting overview of the book, read this article. 

We often wonder if what we do will have any real significance for the future. We seek not only to find meaning in our own lives through what we do, but also to have what we do or say have a significant impact on future generations and to help them find meaning through what we leave behind.

Solomon gives us no guarantees! There is no assurance, from his perspective, that what we do will be significant either for us or for those in the future. So what is the point of life? Chapter 1 focusses on the repetition revealed within all of nature. There is nothing new. There is nothing that is unique enough to be remembered or to make a real change in the cycles of the years and seasons. He even observes that, "in much wisdom there is much grief, and increasing knowledge results in increasing pain." Eccl. 1:18

What can we observe from this reality in our fallen world?

• The more we know, the more we find that we don't understand.
• The more we try to repair, the more we find to work on.
• The more we see, the more disappointed we are with the the brokenness around us.
• We are always surrounded by grief and pain in this life.

These realities are where we live and what constantly causes anxiety and fear in our own hearts and in our relationships. This is the starting point but it does not mean that we must maintain this perspective forever. If we stay here, if there really is nothing more than this, then we certainly have nothing to live for and nothing to hope for. Our task now is to gain a higher perspective which acknowledges this temporal reality but sees beyond it and beyond our limited humanity to a spiritual reality. A new and hopeful perspective is not possible without a calm and reasoned assurance that a spiritual reality does exist and can actually inform a higher perspective.

So, where do we stand? We have to know what is real. We have to know our current context and how our current culture has shaped our concepts about identity and reality. Most importantly, we have to be able to measure and evaluate our perceptions of reality against what is actually true for all time and all people in all situations. Only then as we begin to broaden our perspective of reality can we get a better understanding of our own purpose and value within that reality. 

Solomon summarizes it in this way: "I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God. I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him." Eccl. 3:12-14 (NIV)

What is real? God is real. He is the Creator and His power and wisdom maintain both the spiritual and physical realities of our existence. "In these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word." Heb. 1:2-3 (NIV) What is valuable in our universe? That which He has called "good" as described in Genesis chapter 1, which includes the heavens and the earth, the sea and dry land, the birds and the fish, the animals and the plants, and finally humanity made in His image. 

Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”  So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.” Genesis 1:26-28 (NIV)

This is central to our reality, that God has created the physical universe, that he made us in His image as the caretakers of this reality and that we honor the value that He has placed on His creation by faithfully carrying out His commission. There are many opinions on the "what" and the "how" of reality but no good answers can never be reached without the "why" of reality. Everything begins with God. There is no purpose to anything without Him as Creator. Our own purpose begins to take shape when we understand this reality.

All is Vanity?

 As we look more closely at Ecclesiastes, we will examine a few themes which Solomon explores. These themes also relate to our current context as we attempt to make sense of time, life, death, purpose, meaninglessness, hope, despair and the value and functions of wisdom. If you want a bit more insight into the wisdom literature of the Bible, take a look at a previous post titled Meditate on it Day and Night.

Solomon uses two voices in this book, which he probably wrote nearer to the end of his life. The 1st voice is that of a critic who asks hard questions and provides depressing observations. This voice highlights the reality that life appears many times to be pointless, redundant and inconsistent. A specific Hebrew word is used to express this idea of meaningless, sometimes translated as "vanity" or "futility". The word is "hebel --- הֶבֶל", which can also mean vapor or breath. The idea is closer to the idea of "mist" in the sense that it might hide a clearer vision of what is beyond it while at the same time being transitory or insubstantial.

The 2nd voice is that of a narrator with a higher perspective. This voice provides some explanation, beginning in chapter 9. Here he points us to the reality that even the wisest do not see the whole picture because our perspective as humans is limited. Only the Creator God has the perspective necessary to connect and hold together the full picture and the ultimate meaning of our existence in this life.

The Thinking Atheist

Of course, we are often presented with many challenges from those who believe strongly that there is no God and that we can and should make sense of life using our own brain and the "scientific" resources available to us. We could call this person "the thinking atheist" who may exist as a username in a social media platform, a friend or a family member; however, I'm not sure that this can actually describe a permanent state of being 😏  Let's think through this together... 

To think does involve several things. These include a state of self-awareness, to have something to think about, to evaluate various perspectives and have the capacity to arrive at somewhat accurate conclusions about reality. But there is always a serious limitation to each of these: the limitation of my own brain with its limited input, filtering and processing power. If I ignore this limitation, then I have not met even the first requirement of real thinking, a state of self-awareness.

This expresses the impossibility of "the thinking atheist", that he or she would assume that they have the information needed as well as the unbiased perspective to come to the conclusion that "there is no god". But, how can those who claim to know there is a god be any different? Aren't they also limited by their own brains and bias? Of course, and this is why we cannot completely trust our own thinking but we must still use it as a tool along with the wealth of historical records, the personal experience of others and critical analysis to develop a more comprehensive understanding of reality. The other important tool is humility, essentially a willingness to consider the claims of Scripture and of Jesus within the context of textual analysis and historical evidence. The claims of theology exist beyond the realm of science and the material world but are also subject to reason and patterns of evidence which can be tested in specific ways.

Notice that these other testing methods are also rational (consistent with the proper use of our mind) but are quite different than pure observation of the material world. When Russia announced its first successful manned spaceflight, they declared, "We have now been to space and see that God is not there". Of course this does nothing to prove that He does not exist. As the Creator, He is not limited to or required to appear within His creation. Better reasoning methods might include ontological arguments, cosmological arguments, and teleological arguments for His existence.

If we are willing to seriously consider these claims, then we come to the conclusion that they are either true, or that they are false and therefore completely unreliable. The result of the 2nd option here is that we have nothing to trust except our own perception of reality and no firm position to evaluate any claims of reality, purpose or value in our world (and most especially about the existence of God). If, however, we come to the reasonable conclusion that God reveals Himself and truth through Scripture and the Person of Jesus, then we have a standard by which to evaluate everything about life (including the existence of God).

The Preacher 

We can now consider why Solomon identifies himself as "The Preacher" in Ecclesiastes 1:1. He is providing a perspective for us that is based on reason and experience and then demands an active response from us. We see also that his position is tempered and humble enough to consider the broader context of how God has revealed Himself throughout history and, more specifically, through His laws, His statutes and covenant with the people who were chosen to transmit that knowledge to the entire world. He wants to share that wisdom with us for our consideration. This is a wisdom that is based in reality, that acknowledges the violence and injustice of life, but also sees the beauty, joy and hope that shines through at certain moments for all of us. There is evidence of a design. Although that design has been badly damaged, the design still points to a Designer and can guide us to true purpose and meaning if we are willing to consider it.

Hope for the New Year

What are your hopes and plans for the New Year? This is a question I often ask others and also try to take extra time with at the end of every year. The basis of this question includes a few basic assumptions which are important to understand and also help us to better respond to the question. Of course, the basic assumption is that we do have the capacity to hope. This is a dream that we will both experience and have influence on those days which do not yet exist! This is indeed a miracle in itself.

Integral to the idea of hope is the concept of time. Our current culture tends to assume both the past and the future, which was not always the case throughout history. The past for each of us has included many difficulties and many blessings unique to our own lives and interpretations. Depending on how we view our past, we may be very angry, hurt, disappointed or grateful. But, I believe, at the very least, we should recognize that the time we have been given already is more than we deserve. Life has provided time to grow and learn and time to impact the lives of others. For this reason, we should decide to be grateful and to use what we have learned in order to live with more wisdom in the future. But who can guarantee that we have more time to live? Can we assume that we will be given another day of life? If I wake up tomorrow, it will be another miracle and a blessing that cannot be paid for with any amount of money, power or influence. When I take the past and the future for granted, I ignore one of the greatest blessings in life - the opportunity to live with gratefulness for the past and hope for the future! 

In taking time for granted, we also ignore the opportunity to live differently and to benefit from the wisdom of our previous days and experiences. The most significant of these experiences for each of us usually centers on the concept of forgiveness. In my own life, what has hurt me most is not the hurtful actions of other people toward me, but my refusal to forgive them. When I do not forgive, there is a cancer that eats away at my heart, not allowing me to enjoy life or relationships or even to have meaningful hope for my future. My mind is distracted by what I cannot control, the actions or words of others. My energy and time are spent on that which has no real benefit for me or for anyone else. However, when I learn to forgive others and to be grateful both for the lessons they have taught me and for the opportunity to grow through difficult circumstances, then something significant has happened. I realize that I am not the center of the universe, that I have been blessed beyond measure and that each new day is a gift. Both the ability to forgive and to be grateful for everything are essential if we are ever to have real hope for the future.

Looking back at the history of the Israelites leaving Egypt gives us some insight into how these attitudes impact a community. They were constantly told to remember: remember that you were slaves in Egypt, remember that God brought you out with a mighty hand, remember how God provided for you in the wilderness, remember the covenant God has made with you, remember to obey God's commands which are for your good and for your blessing. Many of these reminders fell on deaf ears because they refused to be grateful. This in turn restricted their ability to learn from the past and to hope and trust in God's goodness and provision for their future. Even though they had been freed from physical slavery, they were still enslaved to their past though their refusal to be grateful and so to trust God.

Can you see echos of this slavery to the past in your community? How about in your own life? This slavery to the past means we will always be a victim unless we learn to forgive and to be grateful. When we learn to see that God has allowed us to live and to experience difficult things in order to help us grow, then we honor His purposes, recognize His goodness and learn to trust Him for our future as well.

It is only then that I can begin to really answer the first question, "What are my hopes and plans for the New Year?" Now I am free to hope. Now there is a purpose in planning. Now we begin to understand the gift of life and the significance of this point in time. Our plans can be shaped by God's plans because we begin to recognize what He has been doing in our lives and our potential based on what He has promised to do. Our hope is in Him because without His forgiveness for my sin, there is no power to forgive others. Most importantly, our plans will not be centered on our own benefit but on the growth of His kingdom in our relationships and community because that is the only thing of real value, bringing hope and purpose to others through the knowledge of Him.

...but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. Romans 5:3-5

Here are a few related questions that can help bring clarity to our basic question... What ministries and projects will I invest in this next year? What topics do I need to learn more about? Which relationships do I need to invest in? How will I organize my daily priorities and schedule to accomplish this? How will I spend more quality time in God’s Word with my wife and boys? How will our budget and actual spending reflect our values as a family? One of my goals for the New Year is to share some of my findings from my personal study of God's Word here in this blog. My personal study in the past several months has been rich and rewarding as I learn to connect what God says through His story of the world to what is happening in the world around me, in my own work and family context, and in my own heart. This is a process that brings real hope because it teaches me to see the bigger picture of life, to be truly grateful for what God has given and to put into practice the habits of forgiveness and gratitude by His grace at work in me.

Next year I will share some of my insights from Ecclesiastes. Solomon struggled deeply with the concepts of hope, gratefulness and ultimate meaning in life and he has some important things to share with us!

Inspiring biblical leadership

It is interesting that each community usually takes on the personality of its leadership and its leadership is also a reflection of the values of that same community. Depending on the values of the community, this could produce very different types of leaders, leaders who only serve themselves or leaders who serve others.One approach would be to identify what biblical leadership means and then develop leaders who will embody those ideals, leading to a community that reflects those same characteristics. This could provide leaders truly concerned about others and who work to empower their community to flourish.

So, what is biblical leadership? First, it is clear that leaders must value truth. When leaders paint a picture that is inaccurate or purposefully misleads people, they destroy trust between people and hope for a better future. Lying leaders are rejecting their God-given responsibility to act wisely and effectively for the good of their community. Lying leaders almost never take responsibility for their own actions but often blame others. This further divides and establishes negative control over the community. Biblical leaders always communicate truthfully in order to demonstrate responsibility and call others to be accountable and responsible as well.

We also see that real leaders place a high value on forgiveness and reconciliation. In fact, this was the purpose of Jesus' incarnation and death, bringing us back into relationship with God and providing a means of reconciling our earthy relationships as well. When leaders provide an environment for reconciliation, real community is possible and the distinctive perspectives of groups within that society can contribute to the flourishing of the whole community.

There is much more to biblical leadership but the point here is that real leaders are desperately lacking in our world. The only means of developing good leaders is to know what biblical leadership is and to live it out in our own lives. This is an integral role of the Christian family, the church and, of course, the Christian school.

In 1999, ACSI Europe began a program for our member schools called the Student Leadership Conference. Originally this brought together small groups of secondary students from many of our local schools in Hungary, Romania and Germany with some of the international English speaking schools in our region. The purpose was to provide a setting for these youth to learn about biblical leadership and develop a simple plan for serving their schools and their peers in their own communities. It also challenged the chaperones and teachers coming with each group to consider how they could further train and develop some type of leadership development program in their own school settings. All of this took place in an English speaking environment with times set aside for worship and learning, games, workshops on biblical topics and small group discussions.

Over the years, we learned that schools really depended on this program to help them think through the challenges they were facing in their own communities. They saw that many students who left home after graduation were also leaving behind their faith because they had not made the essential connections between their faith and their own life purpose. This meant they did not remain faithful to God. Some schools began to realize that they needed to give their students more voice in the culture of the school and provide meaningful ways for their students to contribute to that culture. Students must learn to lead themselves and challenge each other spiritually and not always be led by adults. This involves an intentional commitment on the part of school leadership.

There are many stories of success over the years of SLC. In one case a crazy fundraising idea from students who attended SLC led to the purchase of a new school that was desperately needed. Students designed posters for their hallways that helped their classmates focus on the values their school promoted. Students who attended SLC realized they needed to design a way to support students who were struggling socially or academically in order to help them succeed. Other students started a prayer group that prayed for the needs and spiritual growth of their teachers. These action plans were designed by students attending SLC to meet the needs that God was revealing to them because of their willingness to follow Him. In one sense, the adults were just along for the ride but they provided the support and accountability needed for those plans to be carried out. God was working in the students to live out biblical leadership now, not just to prepare to lead at some point in the future.

This is the purpose of the Student Leadership Conference. Our calling is to create a space where students can understand what biblical leadership looks like and respond to God's call to lead now where He has placed them. If they are willing to step out in faith, God will continue to use them in each new setting to meet the real needs of their communities. Sometimes those needs are spiritual in nature. Sometimes we are unable to meet spiritual needs until we address other basic needs. But we are God's hands and feet and we are the ones who live out God's love and care for those around us in our communities.

In what ways do you encourage and enable student leadership in your context? Do you ask your youth to identify the needs they see in your community? Do you give them a clear vision of what biblical leadership should be? Do you provide the space and the tools for them to meet the needs of others? These are important questions to ask if we are serious about growing Christian leaders within our communities.

Conversation - additional thoughts

After reflecting on my posts from January a bit more, here are a few other things that come to mind...

1. It is difficult to have meaningful discussions when we can't agree on common terms or definitions of words. Words like mother, father, marriage, love and even truth are now being twisted so that reality is redefined by how I want to see the world and how I require others to see the world.

2. It is difficult to have meaningful discussions inside a social construct of emotivism. Social media especially is mostly about getting attention and this must be done with images or ideas that grab emotions and usually avoid critical thinking or self-reflection. Any explanations or real discussion is avoided if I can just have the last word in the argument. An additional layer of complexity is the fragility of our emotional state that requires others to acknowledge my imagined reality (or assumed identity) on my terms for me to "feel good about myself".

3. It is difficult to have meaningful discussions when history is only viewed in the negative as what should always be left behind and never as a way of remembering the noble and enduring or as a means of understanding our current reality. This is further damaged by requiring every previous society to have the same understanding and values as our current society, judging them by our standards, and an ethnocentrism that assumes others must think the same way as us.

These are complex topics and I will need to develop each of them better in the days to come. I'm currently reading Carl Truman's The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self. This is an academic treatise on the history of how we arrived at our current socially accepted standards of expressive individualism. It is a fascinating and informative work, revealing the gradual progression from acceptance of our identity and role within a social structure to complete rejection of a these socially integrating concepts at almost every level.

Let me just make a few comments about the first point. In our conversation (covered in the last 9 posts), Derek and I could not agree on several terms nor even on how to use logic as a foundation for reaching meaningful conclusions. But why is the use of words so important? Why do we depend on words for logic? What is the relationship between words and numbers or symbolic language and is one more useful or precise than the other? Dr. John Lennox has something to say about this topic as a professor of mathematics at Oxford. His recent discussion with Jeff Myers is helpful. 

"Albert Einstein was sufficiently bright to be amazed at the fact that mathematics works." Math actually does explain reality and does this in terms that can be understood by the human mind. This is because reality is knowable and real numbers have real meanings. There are only 2 explanations for this phenomena that I can find. The first is that a mind that uses words to describe reality and order the physical universe has brought everything into existence and also created us with the same capacity to know, to evaluate and to describe that reality with words. The other is that numbers just happen, by chance, to have enough meaning and relation to reality to make some partial sense of things. But if you know anything about math, you know the 2nd option is really not an option at all. There is just too much that math is able to explain.

We must also acknowledge that math is just another form of language. Granted, it is more precise language because it deals with quantities and variables, but it is still language because it uses symbols to describe real things that we can touch, see, hear, taste, smell and quantify. Moving away from math, the language of logic can function in a similar way when the terms being used have specific meaning. The less meaningful the terms, the more difficult it is to express reality. This is part of the conflict when we cannot find an agreeable definition of basic terms.

In my recent study of Isaiah (God's words through Isaiah), there are beautiful patterns in God's warnings and promises to His people. They continue to rebel and trust in themselves and others rather than in God. But He also reminds them that the punishment for their rebellion also has an end and He will be faithful to restore His Kingdom. Part of this restoration involves words and meanings. Isaiah 29:17-21 is a good example. Won't it be "just a little while" until we grow, know, understand and rejoice in the Lord? This will be the end of those intent on doing evil. Their evil consists of a twisting of words and of meaningless arguments that ensnare the judges of the people (gatekeepers). 

Words do have meaning and God is the One Who speaks them, breathing life into all that exists, maintaining reality by His Word and even speaking Himself into our world to bring us back to Himself and restore our (yours and my) meaning and purpose through Christ's death and resurrection. Those are powerful and beautiful words! "They will sanctify My name; indeed, they will sanctify the Holy One of Jacob, and will stand in awe of the God of Israel" Isaiah 29:23. Jesus says in Matthew 24, Mark 13 and Luke 21, "Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away." His Word, the words of the Creator, set the foundation for reality, the full scope of human history and beyond into eternity.

Conversation - part 9

How can we build understanding with those who profoundly disagree with us?

Be sure to read the previous posts on this topic from January 2022 to get the full story...

So, here we are at the end of the conversation. I hope it has challenged you to think at least half as much as it challenged me. I believe that it was valuable for Derek on several levels as well and, although he did not respond to me again, it seems that we reached some degree of understanding and relationship. The point of conversations is certainly to point to truth but this is difficult to do without also making a priority of building relationship and communicating the value of the other person in the process. We don't have to agree with their perspectives but we do have to demonstrate humility and compassion. I must realize that I don't have all the answers but I must be relentless in my search for truth and faithful confidence in God and His Word as the ultimate source of truth. 

My response was posted near the end of March 2020, at the beginning of a global pandemic, and is mainly focussed on the concepts of human value and purpose. Looking back, it seems it was an appropriate topic and was important for my own processing of events in my life! Do you think that I may have been a bit hard on Derek at certain points in this post? How could I have been more compassionate and humble while still communicating truth? Could I have more clearly pointed him to the love of Jesus and the purpose He calls us to?

My final response:

Hi Derek. Obviously it has taken me a while to respond this time for many reasons. Our world situation is quite volatile and my personal situation has not helped either: processing the death of my dad, moving back temporarily to the US, continuing work and helping my boys with online school, etc. But some response in our discussion is better than none, so I’ll add a few ideas here. Thanks for your patience and I really hope you are doing well physically and emotionally (and even spiritually!) during these challenging days!

I would begin from the other end of the spectrum with “once you begin to study and understand the ‘spiritual’, you realize that there is really something there.” But this must be qualified because we need to understand our terms, as you so wisely point out. I will not address the ‘paranormal’ here as that is a separate discussion and a tiny sub-point of the concept of ‘spiritual’.

You made some good points about purpose: Why should we be so selfish to think we have importance on a cosmic scale? What exactly is a spirit? Morality is part of our humanity/history and does not ‘require’ religion. You even agree that your personal morality recognizes the value of treating others with respect and empathy (even if it makes no difference in the bigger picture of life).

Yes. Fine. I can personally be satisfied with these answers if I was only concerned about myself and our friendly conversation. The problem is that I’m always driven to look at the bigger picture to think of the consequences of these ideas.

Here are a couple concepts that connect respect, hope and meaning to the bigger ideas of human value (and possibly help to define ‘spirit’).

How do we determine human value? It must be calculated by something. If it is physical, racial, ancestral, skills or knowledge (capacity or usefulness), power, wealth, relational value or something else, then that is one thing - but it gives everyone a different value. Those who are more valuable then have the right to discard or discredit those who are less valuable. If human value is a moral or a spiritual reality, that is entirely a different matter and gives meaning to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) which is founded in the biblical concept of “imago dei”.

If we look at fairly recent history, American slavery is a prime example of the horrific misinterpretation of spiritual value of the individual as well as an affirmation of biblical truth on this topic. It’s interesting that many slaves accepted and embraced Christianity for the hope and assurance of a God who loved them and demanded justice in spite of the abuses and outright lies of supposedly “Christian” slave owners. The work of Harriet Beacher Stowe, William Wilberforce, Harriet Tubman and many others show the power of biblical truth in the fight for justice and human rights simply because human value does NOT depend on utilitarian concepts or physical properties but spiritual value. How am I caring for those around me that are not valued by their community or society?

Nietzsche says that “compassion is weakness and nothing is more unhealthy than Christian compassion.” This is revolting. I have heard secular educational leaders in Romania note that the true definition of tolerance is Christian love. Christianity, specifically followers of Jesus, must engage in the work of serving the outcast and the powerless.

Comment: We don't serve the outcast because they are more valuable or morally superior, but because it is simply obedience to God, exercising care and stewardship in love to those who need it. This is called "charity".

We just watched the movie Harriet in early March. Maybe you saw something different, but we were amazed by the radical contrast between the value her “owner “ gave to her and her real value both as a person and as a recipient of love and grace that she could pass on to others. Even in the face of devastating loss, when she finds her husband is lost to her, her value does not change.

Is there anything else in the universe that determines its own meaning or its own value? Does a chair determine its meaning or value? Does an idea or a dog or a potato or a business or a currency determine its own value? So how can I determine my own meaning or value? What differences would make me able to do that?

So when you note that it is selfish to assume humans have importance on a cosmic level, you are absolutely right! This is why it is so important to see that many humans who have done this have committed unspeakable atrocities, sometimes in their own name and sometimes, tragically, in the name of their god. But the Bible clearly communicates that humans are fallen and yet valued by God who gave His Son Jesus to redeem them.

What does that say about how God values me and every other person on earth? I have to conclude that I have value because the one who made me also loves me so much that He is willing to die to demonstrate my value to Him and bring me back into a relationship with Him. The Bible tells us “But God demonstrates His love to us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5) The value that God places on us is real (demonstrated in Christ) and it is permanent (because He maintains that value, not me, not my circumstances, not my relationships). The amazing thing is that my value remains unchanged whether or not I accept it, ignore it or even spit on it. True value can only be assigned by the Creator and not by the creation. Anything else is worthless.

Purpose with this perspective is a massive and unmoving mountain before us “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your mind and all your strength”. This joins what we know about God with a heart of thankfulness and joy and hands that serve those around us with courage, compassion and sacrifice.

Final questions:

Am I willing to love God above everything else, even my own safety, comfort, reputation, security or future? Is this purpose the central expression of both the Old and the New Testament? Is it a true reflection of God's desires for us and command to us? How do we know that for sure? How do my daily activities and conversations reflect this grand purpose? Is this even possible without a deep shift in my character and the desires of my heart as well as how I filter and process ideas? How can I learn to love God more completely, hate what He hates and love what He loves?

Conversation - part 8

 How can we build understanding with those who profoundly disagree with us?

Be sure to read the previous posts on this topic from January 2022 to get the full story...

This was Derek's 7th and last post in the conversation. I will provide my response later because this is such a long entry and I should add a few notes at the end here. His opening was really nice and I appreciated his friendly tone and recognition of our growing understanding. He never answered my last post and this brings to mind many questions for me. Did he feel that no more could be accomplished by continuing the discussion? Were there events in his life that changed his outlook dramatically or even made him unable to respond? Why did he later delete all his posts? I may never know. 

Derek's last post:

Hey Paul, I have been busy studying for midterms so I have taken a while to get back to you, but I have finally finished my response. I hope that you carefully read through it, and I apologize for the length (I think it's over 1000 words, sorry), but it shouldn’t be too difficult to digest.

Being a father doesn’t teach one very much about the biology and physics behind the creation of life, as you seem to suggest it does, but I do appreciate the distinction you are making with respect to what you meant when you wrote of logic not giving you life.

I have come to the conclusion that we create our own meaning in life -- this statement may sound silly or trivial, and in a way I would agree, but I don’t believe there is any evidence for some convoluted “great cosmic purpose” for humans existing, and I think that this viewpoint is honestly selfish and it presupposes that humans are incredibly important at a cosmic scale, which I think is ridiculous if you even consider something like the scale of the universe, most of which humans will never actually interact with or observe at all. I think this idea of cosmic purpose, as I am calling it, is what you are mostly getting at in the beginning of your response, but again I find it ridiculous to give humans such abstract importance for no reason.

I will say, lacking an understanding of biological evolution, it would be almost impossible to deny that humans were, in terms of importance, leagues above all other creatures, since humans can do so many seemingly magical things which no other animal, no matter how diverse or strange it is, can do. However, from the perspective of evolution, humans are simply animals and our tools really aren’t as impressive as we might think they are, especially at a cosmic scale.

‘Problems in the world’ are caused by complex interplay of many different subtle factors, saying that there is a primary cause for problems in general is ridiculous.

I see there are other questions about my “purpose in life”, and how I’m “valuable as a person”, which are arbitrary and subjective measures, and I have already explained partially why I don’t believe in cosmic importance of humanity’s existence.

I think I could more concisely summarize my previous statements about logical reasoning by stating that logical reasoning as a whole cannot be ‘caused’ by anything, since cause/effect is intrinsically logical, by definition. This may seem trivial, but it ALL has to do with our definitions, which is what logic is all about. In fact, I could argue that the entire reason I’m an atheist is because I am careful with my words. This is why I believe claiming that logic is ‘caused by something’ is utterly contradictory.

Look, I don’t even have to make a historical argument for morality being separate from religion. Just know that you can google the subject and find pretty convincing historical arguments, such as with the history of burying the dead.

Rather, let me make a case from my perspective: I have moral values, and I can tell you, at least partially, where they come from:

1. My understanding that treating others kindly results in other treating others kindly, which in turn results in a better world.
2. My empathy towards other animals/people, which is admittedly not a logical thought process, but rather a product of both my upbringing and my emotional response centers. However, I would make the argument that the importance of empathy is logically obvious from my above point.
3. My desire to help the world have a better future, despite my belief that I am going to disappear forever after I die, which, similarly, comes from my upbringing and from my understanding of empathy.

It isn’t rocket science, and there really isn’t a great mystery. Morals come from life experiences, from what your parents teach you, and from your brain chemistry. It’s a combination of these, and possibly more, factors. Also, I could make an evolutionary argument about the importance of morality in human (conscious) society, being that the evolution of empathetic feelings and sentiments cause people to stick together and form communities, to communicate, form language, work out issues with non-violence, etc… all of which act to prolong survival, and increase odds of reproductive success. My main point is that morality can indeed be understood as a logical mechanism, rather than a greatly mysterious entity (the same is true with consciousness, I would argue).

Now, we get into my beef with the terms “spiritual”, etc… , which I contest are inherently rhetorical. The concepts of spirituality, the paranormal, etc… exist because of man’s inability to fully understand the world around us. Think about it, what EXACTLY is a spirit? It is described by many as , say, “ the part of you that survives after you die, which includes your personality”, right? Well, doesn’t this sound ridiculous when you try to actually contemplate it? How can this be possible? What substance is a spirit made of? Is it your personality from the moment you died, or your personality from another age? What mechanism is responsible for this? Can we mathematically model this phenomena? Why should I even believe this is true? Does anybody have any actual evidence of this happening, or even a sound argument for why such a thing should exist? What about conjoined twins - do they have one or two spirits? The brain is responsible for one’s personality, which is something that is a relatively new discovery for mankind. How does the brain connect to the spirit? What about the fact that your brain is literally comprised of two personalities? So many seemingly fundamental questions go completely unanswered every time I bring this up with someone who endorses these ideas of spirituality, etc… and it seems to me that the spirit is just the precursor to understanding the functions of the brain (which we still don't fully comprehend).

Think about “the paranormal” as well. People describe an event as being paranormal only in the case that they cannot explain the event, or do not understand it. In this way, 'paranormal' is just a superfluous term which communicates “ I don’t understand that”. However, people who endorse the paranormal typically claim “the event cannot be explained” and then do not provide evidence for why this should be believed. They might rightfully dismiss some logical explanations, but then they make the astonishing leap to dismissing all possible logical explanations.

If you remember me talking about how problematic it is to state that logic is caused by some external “thing”, it is similarly problematic to state that something can be caused without logic being involved, since we arrive at an instance of saying “A causes B” but we are not actually using the correct definition of “cause” (since we are saying the causation is illogical - which doesn’t make sense - the whole point I’m trying to make). To summarize, ‘explaining’ something as “paranormal” is actually just evading explanation using rhetoric.

Once you start trying to explain the paranormal, it just becomes scientific theory so that the qualification “paranormal” becomes completely superfluous.

Similarly, once you start trying to study and understand the "spiritual", you realize that there is nothing there.

A few notes and some questions:

So, in some ways we are back to where we began but with a very different tone and hopefully a deeper appreciation for the other person in the conversation. I believe that this is almost all we can expect but certainly we can pray for more, knowing that the Spirit of God is at work in our hearts and is really the only one who can change us. I pray that I was sensitive to His leading in this conversation and that I was truly attentive to the hopes and the fears behind what Derek so graciously shared with me.

As you can see, there are still a few difficult points to deal with from his post. Now he is trying to define the term "spiritual" but it seems to be mixed up with the idea of "paranormal". I address this briefly in my response. The bigger issue, however, is the meaning of life and the value of human life in particular. Thankfully he did spend quite a bit of time on the questions I had provided. His answers are fairly good, considering the perspective he is working from. This is where I spent most of my time in my final response. Meanwhile, how would you respond to his post? How can you provide a real and useful definition of "spiritual", if that is even possible? What can you say about the meaning of life or the value of human life? How can you know that your answers to anything here have real value or meaning?

Conversation - part 7

How can we build understanding with those who profoundly disagree with us?

Be sure to read the previous posts on this topic from January 2022 to get the full story...

A few comments:

Now we are nearing the end of our conversation. This post from Derek reveals a continued shift in his attitude and openness. It was really encouraging to see this from him, though there is still some miscommunication at times. He also seems to be reading my posts more carefully, directly responding to my questions, clarifying ideas and noting the occasional shared perspectives. These are good signs! Again, it is not my primary intention to convince him of anything by proving him wrong. Rather the point of the conversation is to share our own perspectives, grow in our understanding and appreciation of each other and lay a basis for a real friendship. This now seems to be the direction in his post as well. These are both a bit long...

Derek wrote:

Hello Paul, thanks for keeping up the discussion. I really enjoy getting to share my views, and learn about how you see the world. Also, this gives me great practice articulating my thoughts clearly, which I have trouble doing with such complex topics.

I am not an atheist because I haven't seen or heard god. In fact, if I did see or hear god, as many people claim they have, then I would have to rule out the possibility of my experience being some type of delusion before I could begin to claim that my experience is evidence for god's existence.

Rather, I am an atheist because I haven’t yet discovered any objective evidence in support of any god’s existence or been exposed to any sort of logical argument with acceptable assumptions which proves that any sort of god must exist.

You say “even logic can’t give me life” but I’m confused as to what you mean by this. The entire process of childbirth is a logical process, down to the biochemical level. What leads you to believe god has anything to do with the process of childbirth? I mean, it just doesn’t make sense to me. There isn’t a great mystery, like there was when the bible was written, with respect to where children “come from”. Science has bridged the gap completely.

You also claim that science doesn’t explain consciousness, but this is another example of where I believe you would be right using “hasn’t yet” rather than “doesn’t”, since the latter is a rather bold affirmative statement about the limitations of science and reason.

You say “logic is not natural” but this confuses me, since the very definition of natural is existing in nature, uncaused by man. If you accept that logical cause-and-effect still holds true outside of your own experiences, which I hope you do, then logical reasoning exists independent of man - which makes it natural, by definition of the word “natural”.

You say “logic is completely dependent upon the existence of order and design” which is interesting to me, and it got me thinking pretty hard for a while until I thought of something. How can logic depend on anything, in any meaningful sense? This is philosophically problematic to me, since the claim that logical reasoning as a whole depends on “A” effectively presupposes a logical dependence of the entire system of logic upon “A”… which is self defeating, since then the entire system of logic is caused by itself, rather than having a completely removed cause. Sorry if this hurts your head to think about, this avenue of ontological discussion is incredibly rich and complex.

I have read of Nietzsche’s worries about the spread of atheism, specifically to his worries about declining morality, etc… and I have to say I believe it is demonstrated that morality historically predates religion, and I can argue that I have morals as an atheist, which don’t derive from the bible or from religion at all. So for me, these worries are based on a mistaken chain of causality, and historical ignorance.

With respect to Newton, he was absolutely an unbelievable genius. He was a pioneer in mathematics (although the common claim that he single handedly “discovered” calculus gives him WAY too much credit) and he essentially pioneered the field of physics, but this doesn’t mean that his views should be automatically considered brilliant just for his namesake. He was a major proponent of alchemy, which of course was nothing more than pseudoscience to begin with. In fact, it is conjectured by some historians that Isaac Newton spent more time trying to find “patterns” in the bible, or trying to transmute metals into gold, than he did doing work in mathematics or physics, and I have always wondered how much more he would have accomplished if he would have rejected religion and alchemy, and dedicated those thousands of hours to seeking real truth.

If you are interested in Newton's biblical studies, I believe at least some of it is archived online.

I am always searching very hard for truth, so if god is real and he wants to reveal himself to me I’m completely open to that. However, I won’t take anything less than what I can be sure is the truth.

Commentary: 

There are a few confusing ideas in his post and I am not completely sure how to address them. The comment about "nature as uncaused by man" is fine but doesn't address my real meaning or use of the word from my previous post. His comment that "logic must not presuppose a logical dependence on something else" is also adequate when we assume that logic is "natural" and uncaused by man. The problem with this is that we actually live in an ordered and logical universe that we can know and study. But why is this the case? Is this the guaranteed result of a random evolutionary process? Has this result ever happened at any level with any simplified environment without the intervention of intelligent design? If not, then how can logic be truly uncaused? Note that there are plenty of random and illogical tendencies all around us... Things get disorganized. I lose my car keys. The faucet begins to leak. The tornado wipes out a town. We get sick and die. Everything is given to decay and nothing ever "puts itself back together" without someone there to do the planning and get the job done. The "natural world" is moving from order to chaos, not the other way around. There is quite a bit of deep philosophy here and I'm nearing the limit of my cognitive abilities!! 

Once again, my response was an attempt to clarify a few things but also to move toward a deeper understanding of who Derek is. The questions I use here are ones I've developed over the last few years to investigate my own beliefs and the beliefs of others. They address some of the basic issues of the heart such as conviction of sin, forgiveness, faith, hope, identity, trust, surrender and purpose.

My response:

Yes, I’m really grateful for this discussion as well, Derek. It is not my primary intention to convince you of anything because I believe that the discussion has value in itself. This really helps us both think through the consistency of our ideas, learn to communicate them more clearly and also to benefit from the friendship that comes through respectful dialogue. It seems that many things I’m reading and listening to these days connect to aspects of this conversation, so I end up thinking about how to continue this discussion at least once a day. Let me respond to your post and then address a couple related issues.

What do I mean by “logic can’t give me life”? I understand very well the biological and mechanical aspects of life because I am both a husband and a father. This is not what I mean. My statement is addressing the quality and the meaning of life. What is the purpose of human life and my life in particular? What value do I have as an individual apart from what I know or can contribute to society? Is there something more to human existence than consuming and producing (the material or natural functions of biological life)? These questions, from a humanistic worldview, define the value of the person as being dependent on what they contribute to society.

So when I refer to “life”, I mean “How does my response to these questions reflect a deep and meaningful understanding of reality while shaping how I live and interact with others?” Here are the questions I would challenge you to address as well (which may take months or years…).

• What do you think is the primary cause of the problems in our world?
• What do you believe to be your greatest need of all time?
• Is there a solution to the problems you currently face? Describe the solution.
• How would you describe yourself and how does that make you valuable as a person?
• If you were to be the judge and jury for everyone, how would that transform our world into a happy, peaceful and productive society?
• How would you describe your purpose in life and how are you currently fulfilling that mission?

As I look back through our discussion, it seems that we have slightly different approaches to how logic is used and how it enables us to come to conclusions. I do appreciate your comments on the “origin of logic”, although I confess this is a bit beyond me and I don’t see how this argument is self defeating. But it seems that you want to force deductive logic into situations that really call for inductive logic with a ‘coefficient of accuracy’. Please correct me if I’m wrong. When I come to a conclusion in the area of philosophy or theology, I don’t believe that these can usually be addressed by deductive logic (I’m thinking out loud here). It seems that I depend more on inductive logic which allows me to draw probable conclusions from observations, history and personal experience while evaluating how accurately these conclusions describe reality. Does this make sense to you?

Thank you also for your very insightful comments on Nietzsche and Newton. But I’m not sure I understand how morality predates religion. For me, both morality and religion are completely integral to the human experience. Morality certainly predates Judaism and Christianity, but essentially religion can be defined as recognition of a spiritual reality (real or perceived) and the human response to that reality. Morality may be a sense of right and wrong and our responsibility to act, think and speak in alignment with what is right. For those who do not recognize a spiritual reality (absolute or eternal standards of right and wrong) those standards either come from within ourselves (heart/mind/spirit?) or as cultural and social expectations - either way, it ends up to be a type of religion either of “me as god” or “culture as god”. Maybe you have a better way of expressing this?

Questions for you:

What is the point of discussions like these in your experience? Have you been able to work beyond the tendency toward conflict and differing perspectives? How did you do that? What was the result? Do you think it is more important to focus on the relational aspect and potential in such conversations? Why or why not?

Conversation - part 6

How can we build understanding with those who profoundly disagree with us?

Be sure to read the previous posts on this topic from January 2022 to get the full story...

Commentary:

This post shows a real shift in Derek's attitude and willingness to open up. I was very grateful for that. He even tells some of his story about growing up in a Christian home, although there is no information on how his parents lived out their faith or helped him to grow spiritually or intellectually. My impression is that there were strong secular forces at work in his life, either through friendships, teachers or other adults which influenced his ideas about God and faith. 

Derek's post:

I could be convinced that science/logical reasoning had an inherent limitation in its ability to explain phenomena if you could provide me a logically sound argument along with acceptable premises in support of this. It's that simple, and it is 100% objective. That's the beauty of logic.

You act like it is completely subjective what I consider to be evidence, but it is simply what I have stated above - a logically sound argument with acceptable premises. This is also the type of evidence that I would require in order to believe a god exists (or physical evidence of some sort, of course).

The 'logically sound' aspect means that the argument doesn't violate itself or contain a logical contradiction, and the 'acceptable premises' part means that the argument begins with axioms which anybody would consider to be obviously true.

To recap, the two claims:
"science hasn't yet explained A"
"science is not able to explain A"
are completely different, and you need a logically sound argument supporting whichever one you are claiming to be true. The first claim is trivial to support, but the second one requires, as I keep repeating, a logically sound argument with acceptable premises.

I will repeat this again: if you can actually logically prove the second claim, you will indeed be awarded the nobel prize since it would be a major finding relating to science and mathematics, and our ability to understand the universe.

There isn't really much of a story as to why I am an atheist, other than the fact that I have taken a very close look at all religious arguments I have been able to find, from as many different religions as I could manage. In this seven or so year examination, I have found that the arguments are all very well dressed, and that they appear to be reasonable until you break the intuition-logic barrier and realize that they don't actually make sense.

I mean, I used to be a christian until I was a teenager, and then I slowly realized that I hadn't ever seen god, or spoken to god. This bothered me greatly, and it kept me awake for some nights, and I would get to sleep by reading some argument online that would affirm me god existed. However, I would wake up and go through one, two, maybe a few days before I had time to think again, and I would realize that there was some sort of hole in the argument that didn't quite add up. This kept happening, and I started to think Jesus and the Christian God might not actually be real. I really was unsettled by my inability to confirm my beliefs. I looked at arguments in support of other gods from other religions, and realized they were all the same in their flaws. Every argument was either "the universe is too complex, ..." or "god's existence is so obvious that it is undeniable" or "atheists aren't real", or it was a well dressed pseudo-logical argument that would quench my thirst for a while, but then I would realize it was flawed too.

Fast forward, and I have come to the conclusion that the average person's inability to distinguish logical reasoning from flawed argumentation is hurting society greatly, and that it is one of the biggest threats to humanity for a number of reasons. This extends beyond religions too, and goes into many aspects of society.

Commentary:

I was still wondering what type of evidence Derek needed. It is as if I had not provided any arguments yet at all! His comments about not seeing or hearing God are not based on logical or rational evidences, but rather experiential evidence, which is tied to how most of us interpret evidence anyway. I probably had already answered his questions clearly and concisely with references to history, philosophy and the Bible. If we demand that others present the same kind of ‘evidence’ that they demand of us, we usually don't end up any closer to agreeing than when we started. I'll include a modified infographic to demonstrate the types of evidences that are commonly accepted in most fields outside of direct scientific experimentation. 

He spent quite a bit of time explaining logic to me, but I'm not convinced that he knew how to recognize it or use it. So my response had to go in a different direction. I also needed to validate his desire to understand the world and to communicate with me about these topics.

My response:

Yes, logical reasoning is really important and I am also interested in this. So, thanks for your extended explanation and a bit of your story. It does make me very sad to hear that having not seen or spoken to God, you must conclude that He doesn't exist. You are not alone in this, as I have not seen or heard an audible voice. But, logically speaking, that doesn't mean that he is not speaking to us, only that we don't hear him or are expecting something different.

I have also heard arguments like "the universe is too complex", etc. but those certainly are not the ones that convince me either. My faith in Jesus is not from having seen him or heard him speak to me, but because I can't live without Him. I know that I have no good in myself, no value, no purpose unless it is given to me by the one who gives me life. Even logic can't give me life or purpose because logic does not explain why we have "something" instead of "nothing", or "life" instead of "non-life", or "consciousness" instead of just a brain, or beauty or love or even logic itself. Don't get me wrong, I love logic as well. But I must conclude logically that logic and order in the universe are not natural and are certainly not a result of a random sequence of events. Logic is completely dependent on the existence of order and design, not to mention the very strange idea that words actually have meaning - a correlation to the real world - and that we can "know" the real meaning of words.

Here are 2 interesting quotes for you (from people much smarter than me). Friedrich Nietzsche said, "Two things will happen: the 20th Century will become the bloodiest century in history because the 19th Century killed God and universal madness will break out." Isaac Newton said, "He who is presumptuous enough to think that he can find the true principles of physics and the laws of natural things by the force alone of his own mind, and the internal light of his reason, must either suppose the world exists by necessity, and by the same necessity follows the law proposed; or if the order of Nature was established by the will of God, the [man] himself, a miserable reptile, can tell what was fittest to be done." They lived very different lives and had very different beliefs but they both realized the logical result of a world without God, a world that we are living in now.

My dear friend, please keep searching and I pray that God will show himself to you in a new and very real way - not for any religious reason, but so that you will know Jesus who offers us real life.

Questions for you:

What evidence would you demand to know for sure that God exists and that He loves you? Would it be reasonable and fair to demand that same quality of evidence to prove that God does not exist and/or does not love you? Why or why not? Why are we always asking for evidence anyway? Do we really change our minds because of evidence, or is it something else that changes our hearts before our minds are able to change?

Conversation - part 5

How can we build understanding with those who profoundly disagree with us?

Be sure to read the previous posts on this topic from January 2022 to get the full story...

It seems that Derek wrote this in a hurry and maybe did not even intend to post. I received a notification about the post and copied the text, but later was not able to find it in the comments feed.  Some of his ideas here are confusing to me and seem to be contradictory. It is also clear that he did not view the video debate on "Can science explain everything?" as he makes no reference to its content. This my be why he does not understand my argument about science not being able to explain the "why", which leads him to spend a lot of time going in circles. The questions "how" and "why" are very different questions and real science has never pretended nor intended to answer the question "why". Derek is equating logical reasoning with science, which is another problem. Science is a subset of logical reasoning and depends completely on the use of logic whereas logical reasoning is a much broader concept and foundational to the existence of modern science.

He concludes by saying that I have provided no evidence or reasoning for him to change his views, which is his issue, not mine. My intention was never to provide conclusive evidence, but to engage in a conversation which challenged both of us to think more deeply and fully about these ideas. Our entire conversation is about clarifying terminology and identifying the strengths and weaknesses of certain perspectives. What is this if it is not the process of reasoning?

Derek wrote:

Let me just respond to a few points. I disagree with whatever you think "materialism" is. Materialism, at least from my perspective, is the direct consequence of the realization that religious rhetoric (soul, spirit, transcendence, etc...) is meaningless (without definition), and that arguments in support of religious claims are, in my experiences, all flawed. To use the term "material" in "materialism" is honestly silly, since it is a philosophical rabbit hole in and of itself attempting to pinpoint a concrete definition for what it means to be material. Just know my materialism is best described as my observation that all attempts to explain to me why "logic/science can't explain everything" have been deeply flawed, and illogical in nature. I fail to see to what extremity this belief can be taken. "A materialistic worldview also denies the value of love, grace, hope, forgiveness, joy, and such, as meaningful or essential to human nature." - I disagree, I would argue that psychology and biology can quite competently explain why things such as love, hope, forgiveness, etc... can be viewed as important to society and to the individual. The only real difference is that you claim these things' value with respect to humanity cannot be explained by logical reasoning, which I haven't seen anybody demonstrate. You claim that science can't ever answer the "why" of things... which is really the crux of our disagreement. I think what you really mean to say is that science hasn't yet explained everything. That's not how you word it, but that really is what you mean. You can, as you are doing, always focus on details which science hasn't yet uncovered, and then claim this to be evidence that science DOESN'T explain the "why", when in reality science HASN'T YET explained the "why". This is a crucial difference that I think you still are missing. Let me word things a bit differently now. The claim "science never really addresses the "why" of things" is an affirmative claim that science and consequently logical reasoning have inherent limitations in their ability to explain observable phenomena. I need some sort of demonstration of this being true, or some example of something science CAN'T explain, rather than examples of things science HASN'T YET explained. Any demonstration of why science/logic can't explain a particular phenomena would work as well. I'm really not a complicated person to convince, I just need some sort of demonstration that you are right, that's all. I'm not asking for anything unreasonable, am I? If you were to actually present me with some piece of evidence that science has inherent limitation, I would be completely open to studying it in depth, and honestly it would fascinate me. However, without any sort of evidence or reasoning in your favor that I can perceive, I must say I'm still unconvinced of many of your claims.

Commentary:

As we see, Derek and I continue to struggle with basic definitions of words. First is the issue of materialism. A better term for this is naturalism because materialism can also mean a tendency to consider material possessions and physical comfort as more important than spiritual values. Materialism as a philosophy is a position which denies the existence of anything that is outside the natural world or scientific explanation. There is a logical fallacy in this which is obvious to anyone looking at it from the outside but which seems to escape those committed to this position. There are many other challenges to a materialistic view of the universe, some of which are addressed here. Of course, I also need to be aware of my own blind spots and be humble enough to accept the critique of others as I try to align my beliefs about the world with the evidence available to me. One amazing aspect of the Bible is that it accurately describes the human condition with both the worst and the best examples, aligning spiritual realities with the real experiences of real people. You can read a lot more about these ideas in my post Comparing the scope of faith and science

In my response I began to shift my interaction with Derek to find out who he is and what aspects of his personal history have shaped his current beliefs. I felt that this change would help me understand him better and also would be more productive than to continue a debate about definitions that we can't seem to agree on.

My response:

I've seen another response from you but it is not showing up in this thread... You have captured the essence of our discussion, however, and this is exactly where I most need to continue questioning my own assumptions.

You say that you "disagree with whatever I think 'materialism' is". Here is a definition of materialism (or we could use the term “naturalism”) - the philosophical belief that everything arises from natural properties and causes, and supernatural or spiritual explanations are excluded or discounted. -- I’m not sure how this is confusing or silly because this is a very common definition and certainly did not come from me. Definitions don’t come from our experiences but from an understanding of how the word is used and a limitation on what the word does not refer to.

You also mention that you are easy to convince if I could provide you with some evidence. This sounds great but we are still having trouble with agreeing on what evidence is or which type of evidence is acceptable. Thankfully, it is not really my responsibility to convince you, but rather your responsibility to evaluate what you believe and why you believe it. I might say that "this is one thing that science is not able to explain" but you might say “not yet” and we are back where we started. I do want to tell you that I am constantly evaluating what I believe and why I believe it. Admittedly, my starting point may be quite different from yours and this certainly shapes how I filter and process information. Beginning with Genesis 1:1 gives both a purpose for the universe as well as a key to interpret everything from the perspective of how and why God interacts with his creation throughout history. As C.S. Lewis says “I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen - not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.” If I refuse to accept the resurrection of Jesus, an historical fact that the Jewish religious leaders and the Romans knew to be true but could not accept while the disciples and multitudes of Christians have died (and continue to be killed for) believing, then I deny what is as plain as the sun in the sky.

Thankfully we are both able to discuss this respectfully and I really appreciate your good questions. I wish we could sit and talk because I’m sure there is a good story behind your life and why you have come to the conclusions you have.

Questions for you:

What types of evidence do you consider acceptable regarding explanations about the universe or about God? How can you be sure these are valid? Are there experiences in your life that have modified your "list of acceptable evidences"? Why is that? What circumstances might force you to adjust your most basic beliefs about the world?