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07-16-2004, 07:36 AM | #191 | ||
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You have not demonstrated that P1 is the only condition under which P2 would valid. See, you have done a sleight of hand in C3. In P1 you stated that the existence of God means that knowledge obtains; you have not stated that the fact that knowledge obtains entails the existence of God. In short you have demonstrated that the inverse of P1 would be correct. It is possible that knowledge can obtain without the existence of God. Therefore you actually do not have any warrant to make your C3. In short the simple fact that a particular effect is apparent does not necessarily prove a particular cause of said effect unless one can demonstrate that this is the only possible cause for said effect - which you have not done. Your argument rests upon that unspoken minor. A more adequate argument would be: P1. The existence of God is a possible condition under which knowledge obtains. P2. Knowledge obtains. C3. Therefore it is possible that God exists. And, no, I am not confused. No, I have not argued a non sequiter. No, I have not misunderstood what you said. I have directly critiqued your P1, P2 and C3. Deal with that or ignore my post. |
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07-16-2004, 10:38 AM | #192 | |
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time to back it up
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2. OK. But let's keep it to 15 minutes this time. 3. Oh, but I do. 4. Granted. I actually caught that sloppy mistake after I could no longer edit. So, in the interest of utmost accuracy, I make the following modification to what we'll call A1: P1. Iff God exists then does knowledge obtain. P2. Knowledge obtains. C3. God exists. Now that P1 is a biconditional proposition, we no longer fallaciously affirm the consequent and only the antecedent 'God exists' is the necessary and sufficient grounds (or precondition or justification) for the verity of the consequent 'knowledge obtains'. Since we effectively retain modus ponens, the conclusion follows necessarily and so the argument is valid. I take it from your posturing that you will want to contend that P1 is unsound, however. I'll comment on that in a subsequent post. 5. Sure, I could do that if I only wanted to argue God as merely possible. But I am saying more than that; I am saying that God is the inescapable premise, so to speak. Typically expressed, TAG is really more of a meta-argument. More to come. Regards, BGic |
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07-16-2004, 12:00 PM | #193 | |||||
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You said: "Actually, it is not the concept of God that makes human knowing possible, it is God Himself. Though this distinction may seem unimportant to you at this point in our talk." I responded (in different words as I am rephrasing to better facilitate your understanding): Does God make human knowing possible or does our individual knowledge of the universe lead to the concept of God (note that I am using "knowledge" in the way that social historians tend to use knowledge: As the ways in which we conceptually arrange "facts" about the world). In short is God an ontological entites that provides knowledge or is God an epistemological construct that results from our experiences of the world? Quote:
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If A is then B is B is Therefore A is However, this does not track as you nowhere establish "If B is then A is." You continue to assume the inverse of P1 where the inverse is not necessarily a valid extension of P1. Quote:
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07-16-2004, 12:24 PM | #194 | |
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you still need to put some dirt underneath these claims
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2. Granted. 3. As I've said before and say now it is God's actual ontological existence that makes human knowing possible. I eagerly anticipate your inference from this. 4. Incorrect. The problem with the prior formulation of A1 was that P2 fallaciously affirmed the consequent of P1 thereby invalidating the conclusion C3 of A1. The mistake to which I referred was one of validity, not soundness. I was tempted to say that you are confused again here but then you'd just 'walk off the court' so I'll refrain for charity's sake. In necessariis unitas, in dubiis libertas, in omnibus caritas. 5. Incorrect. I have done just that here. You opted not to respond, for whatever reason. 6. Incorrect. I have modified my argument so as to be validating thusly: P1. Iff A is then B is P2. B is C3. Therefore A is 7. Incorrect. See 5. 8. Excellent. So you say that something other than God grounds absolute knowledge? Do tell. 9. If C3 is a non sequitur from P1 and P2 then not only can you allege it as such but you can also demonstrate it as such. Regards, BGic |
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07-16-2004, 01:26 PM | #195 | |
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Now, let me ask the question without P's and C's. (And this may be in the field of anthropology, so if I am wrong, please correct it.) Is it true that a variety of cultures came up with their individual concept of god(s) using the knowledge they had? Assyrians had gods. Babylonians had gods. Egyptians had gods. Romans, Greeks, Norseman. Even Aztecs, Native Americans, Indians, etc. (As an aside, I have heard many a missionary brag about having to create a word for "god" as the wild natives had no such word or concept. Don't know what that means.) So (I would say) we see that knowledge results in a concept of god. In point of fact a great VARIETY of gods, that contradict each other. But BGic would say that all of these persons (despite their intuition) were wrong about the concept of god. The Jews were close, but only the chrisitans got it right. I would also agree with BGic's contention that if there was a god/creator, it would be the author of knowledge. So I have two practical propositions: knowledge creating a concept of god, and a god creating knowledge, BOTH of which seem equally feasible. Therefore, the question of which came first, god or knowledge, as I see it, does not propel us any further. Neither "proves" or "disproves" god. We are now living in the 21st Century with both knowledge and concept of god(s) with no practical way, simply by arguing "there is knowledge" or "there is god(s)" to say which came first. |
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07-16-2004, 01:26 PM | #196 | |||||
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Either way, there is still a non sequiter here. That the existence of A necessitates the existence of B does not necessarily mean that the existence of B necessitates the existence of A. Thus using the existence of B to support the existence of A is unwarranted based upon your argumentation. Quote:
Either way, you are playing bait and switch here. Up until now you have been talking about "knowledge" in the generic; suddenly you are talking about "absolute knowledge." These are not necessarily the same category or entity. We have been talking about grounding knowledge, not grounding absolute knowledge and that is what I will continue to talk about. And, yes, there are numerous ways to ground knowledge: Empiricism, for one; logical argumentation, for another. By the way, if God is the only means by which one can ground "absolute knowledge" then one cannot absolutely prove this to be the case through logical argumentation as you are attempting to do as this argumentation would not be grounded in God. Careful that you do not hoist yourself on your own petard here. Quote:
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07-16-2004, 02:46 PM | #197 |
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Moderator note
I don't know if it's because the weekend is approaching and people are getting tired, but some of the comments on this last page are gettin a little snippy. This has been a good discussion so far and overall it's been conducted with a high level of civility - let's aim to keep it that way. |
07-16-2004, 04:12 PM | #198 | ||||||||||||
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You seem to have a stigma against circular arguments. I understand why, logic tells us not to use them. However, because all argumentation at the ultimate level is in fact circular we should not have the same fear of the circular. We need to discuss these issues because if we don't we are left without true knowledge. You need 3 things to have true knowledge. 1) You must have a true fact. 2) You must believe it to be true and 3) you must have justification for that fact. It is this justification that I am trying to distinguish. Without the justification, it cannot be said that we have true knowledge. Quote:
Of course I have warrant for doing so, they both are claimed as ultimate authorities. I am not comparing different types of things. I am comparing ultimate authorities. Quote:
The "Being" assigns this property to Himself (Exod 3:14, Heb 6:13, Jer 49:13, Jer 51:14, Isa 45:23), and the "Idea" can't even exist without that "Beings" mind. Is that warrant enough? Quote:
I agree that the scientific method is no authority. However, some people do use the scientific method as their authority. I am not stacking the deck. I am comparing the ultimate authorities that people use and it is through no fault of my own that the scientific method falls short as an authority. Quote:
"Here I stand." Huh? Well, if your confused I can inform you that it's not a very good thing to ultimately justify your epistemological basis by saying, "here I stand. It's called "blind faith". Christians are ridiculed for making that statement, but because you happen to be on the atheist side you feel you can get away with it. What is your warrant for criticizing Christians for saying "the Bible says so" when you say, "Well, here I stand"? What if I said "The Bible is inerrant, Here I stand!"? Would you consider this debate over? Maybe I should, that way we could then turn our attention to "more important" questions like "Do fish drink water?" Quote:
Hence them being arbitrary. Don't mince words; just admit it. You are just trusting in an epistemological basis for knowledge that you cannot be sure of and so everything you believe and say is the fruit of that confusion, hence your opinion is arbitrary. You tell me that you are not arbitrary because you can give me "very well reasoned explanations" but you can't tell me why you can trust your reason other than "Here I stand". This is why I am no longer an atheist, because everything within the atheist worldview is ultimately reduced to absurdity. The atheist can only say, "here I stand" or "it is just that way". Only the Christian worldview can answer the question "why is your reason trustworthy" but because you do not like the answer, you refuse to even consider the validity of it. You seem to prefer to offer me your arbitrary opinion and then say, well "here I stand" as if the statement "here I stand" is justified. Quote:
Are you saying by this that the books of the Bible do not claim God to be omniscient? Are you saying by this that nowhere does the Bible say that God is perfect? Are you saying by this that the books of the Bible do not claim to be Gods word? Are you saying by this that nowhere does the Bible say that Gods word is not the truth? Logical deduction equals inerrancy. Quote:
So your saying that the "Bible" did not exist at the time it was written? You may want to rethink that last statement. How can something come into being "centuries" after it was created? The "Bible" as you say, existed when it was written; it was compiled centuries later after people like Marcion tried to deny the authentic books of the "Bible". It is precisely because of heretics like Marcion that the Church compiled the books of the "Bible" into the format that we have today. Quote:
Refer to above. Quote:
They are. You just deny it. As soon as you approach the realm of justification (or ultimates) you suddenly see that its circular and you say "oops! I didn't mean to go there!" You have a choice to either deal with it as it is or "get out of the pool." As long as you don't ask the question, "How do I know my epistemology is correct?" you will have no problems and you can go on saying "its just that way!" or "here I stand". But that will never make for good debate and it will always keep you at the level of unjustified knowledge, or in other words no true knowledge at all. I, on the other hand, will deal with the circularity in worldviews knowing that just because they are circular does not mean that they are wrong. They are only wrong if they cannot justify themselves. So once again I say that the Christian worldview is the only justified worldview. Quote:
Neither you nor I (or anyone else) can justify an ultimate authority. One can neither prove nor disprove an ultimate authority, one can only recognize whether the ultimate authority is justified or unjustified. The ultimate authority must justify itself. Quote:
I assume you mean you have no standardized list, in which case I concede, your right in that you don't have a standardized list. I, on the other hand, do have a standardized list in both the New Testament and Old Testament texts. Again, your objection to the chronology of canonization is ambiguous. Do you doubt the validity of the canon because of the chronology of canonization? Are you saying that the church fathers got it wrong because they standardized the text in the 4th century vs. the 3rd century or 2nd century or 1st century? I am unsure as why the century of the standardization of the Biblical writings is such a problem. Again, I will restate my question; when would have been a good time, for you I mean, for the church fathers to have standardized the texts they already had? The historical fact you ignore is that the church had the Biblical texts in their possession in the first century. One of the rules of canonization is that the text had to be in use and accepted by the church. The "Bible" must have existed in order for that rule to be in place. The church fathers had to take a very serious look at the texts and standardize them because of heretics like Marcion. I don't see what difference it makes if that particular controversy had occurred in the 4th century or the 1st century or even the 19th century. Furthermore, I have been clear that I am reformed in my faith. I therefore do not accept the Roman Catholic Bible with the apocrypha. The mere fact that the Catholic Church accepts the apocrypha in order to justify some of their beliefs does not mean that the Protestant Church has no standardized Bible. Nor does it mean that I am changing the definition of the word “canon�. It means “measuring rod� and I use it in that sense. Robert |
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07-16-2004, 04:44 PM | #199 | ||||||||
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What you are attempting to hammer me with, I will go ahead and address. I explained defeasible and non-defeasible presuppositions. Yes, they are all subject to change upon presentation of proof. Did I not admit to changing my presuppositions previously upon presentation and evaluation of proof/justification? When I argued the difference between defeasible and non-defeasible presuppositions you responded with the following: Quote:
Case one; the woman is self-delusional. She will hold to her presupposition regardless of the rational or empirical data. Moreover, her presupposition is not justified. She knows her son to be innocent but it can be said that she does not have true knowledge. (On the surface level, not the ultimate level) This is a self-induced condition. Case two; the police officer is not self-delusional. He holds to his presupposition and it is rationally justified. He can examine the evidence and come to his conclusions and he is justified in doing so. It can be said that he does have true knowledge. (On the surface level, not the ultimate level) Non-defeasible presuppositions are not a problem when they are justified. How do we apply this example of surface presuppositions to ultimate presuppositions? This is how I evaluate my epistemological basis for knowledge. Is my ultimate presupposition justified? Yes, it is. As I previously argued, and jbernier agreed, we cannot justify our ultimate presuppositions without them being self-authenticating or circular. My ultimate presupposition is the only one that can be self-authenticating; therefore it is the only one that can be justified. It is from this argument that it can be said that atheists are self-delusional. They hold to ultimate presuppositions that can ultimately be reduced to absurdity and it cannot be said they hold true knowledge. Quote:
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07-16-2004, 04:54 PM | #200 |
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from the top
I thought I already explained this but I guess I'll do it again. Iff means 'if and only if', jbernier; it is significantly distinct from just 'if' which makes for conditional propositions. Iff is what remakes P1 as a biconditional proposition and what remedies the prior argument-invalidating fallacy. Apparently there is still a lot of confusion so let's take it from the top.
A1: P1. Iff God exists then knowledge obtains. P2. Knowledge obtains. C3. God exists. Now, before I proceed, are there any questions? I don't want to have to turn the boat around again. By the by, I've yet to see a formulation of the self-styled chicken-and-egg argument. If it can't be formulated then I have no reason to believe it unambiguous and so is of no consequence to me. Regards, BGic |
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