TheDiddleyMan

I thought pre-suppositionalism did not require proofs of any kind.

Vorkosigan[/QB][/QUOTE]

I understand it that way too.They argue "from" God not "to" God. Presuppositionalists don't argue from first cause or design. Of course, I don't have a huge knowledge of presuppositionalism, but this quote from Doug Wilson (a TAGer) in the debate with Theodore Drange sums it up quite well:

The fact that rational thought exists does not entail the conclusion that God exists. It presupposes God's existence. The argument is not "rational thought, and therefore God." The argument is "God, and therefore rational thought." God is never the conclusion; He is the only necessary premise of any argument. This is why many people accuse those who present the transcendental argument of committing the fallacy of petitio principii, that of begging the question. How can one debate the existence of God by assuming or presupposing that God exists? Are you not assuming you are supposed to prove? Exactly so.

But this is not a problem because all ultimate questions involve circularity, and we might as well get used to it.

Kris

I just wanted to make a post on this topic. I am a Christian but I am not interested in arguing with anyone. I enjoy talking to people about my beliefs but heated and meaningless arguments are, in most cases, a waist of time. I have read through several posts here and enjoyed a few of Jack the Bodiless’ posts though I must disagree. They were quite comical and entertaining though. I also find it entertaining to find Atheists complaining about Christians assuming what they “should be proving”. For years Atheists have redefined what it is to be an Atheist so they wouldn’t have to prove God doesn’t exist. They enter into debates where the question “Does God exist?” is asked and two positions should be defended. One position that says, “A God exists” and one position that says, “No God exists”. Instead you get one position that provides evidence for God’s existence and one that takes the position that God doesn’t exist because the other guys evidence isn’t good enough. There are two positions that need to be justified. If you make any assertion you must be ready to justify that assertion. Atheists make an assertion then make the claim they do not need to justify the assertion. They place upon others the duty of proving them wrong. I could take that route also and redefine theism as, one who finds the atheistic objections inadequate. That wouldn't go over to well though would it?

The question at hand is, “What is presuppositionalism”? “Pre-supp”, as I will now call it, starts with the worldviews being used by the two parties within the argument. In this case it would most likely be Naturalism and Creation. I say worldview because each person can view the same world in light of different presuppositions and get different meaning. Presuppositionalists argue it is pointless to discuss the facts because each side interprets any given evidence according to their worldview and get different results, each side feeling their interpretation is the correct one. Within the Christian worldview I assume that the Christian God exists and within the Atheist worldview God does not exist and everything happens through natural processes. One could make the claim that one must prove God’s existence before making the assumption God exists but an equal claim can be made against Atheists knowledge that God does not exist. I am sure that as Atheists you have come across the frustration of arguing with a Christian and that Christian didn’t seem to have a leg to stand on yet did not falter in their beliefs. The same has happened countless times to Christians speaking to Atheists. For example:

It has been said that science does not allow for supernatural explanations and therefore Christians must provide natural explanation or proof for the existence of God. The problem with this view is that supernatural evidence for a supernatural being is totally justifiable. Any natural evidence provided could easily be explained naturally and wouldn’t seem to require a supernatural being. The Atheist is, by this, making it impossible to prove God whether He exists or not. By their definition God cannot be proven. No matter what is presented this atheist will not see credible evidence because of his presupposed criteria.

Your pre-supp can also be seen in this very forum. How many of you who criticize van-til and his works have actually read a book about his work and analyzed his findings to see if such things were true or could be true? I could venture a guess that none of you have. You have presumed, because he comes to the conclusion that God exists he must be wrong and his method must also be wrong. Please do not get me wrong. Christians do the very same thing.

In light of the way we all view our world and the difficulty it is to explain our views meaningfully, to each other, it is necessary to start from the beginning. How well does each worldview comport with reality? Can each worldview account for those things necessary for intelligibility? Greg Bahnsen called them the preconditions for intelligibility. I come to the table knowing that God exists and an Atheist comes to the table knowing Naturalism is true. Who’s pre-supp comports with reality? Who’s pre-supp can account for those things necessary for our conversations and science?

Pre-supp asks each party to first justify the invariant abstract entities such as the laws of logic, morality, induction, and reason. These things must be justified prior to being used. I have yet to find a way in which they can be accounted for within the naturalist’s universe. Atheists use them but are unable to account for why they are able to do so.

The most common argument would be one of morality. An atheist claims that morality is socially or individually derived but this restricts all morals to a social or personal environment. This means that you are unable to judge anything that goes on outside your social environment. It means that you are unable to judge the atrocities that happen within other societies. There are no atrocities, simply people doing things different then you. Right and wrong lose meaning. Those societies cannot be held accountable for things done as long as they were consistent with their own social morality. Morality is reduced to mere opinion and thus one would need to explain why I should refrain from doing what I wish to do? Why should I comport my views to your opinion of right and wrong. This view obviously does not work and does not comport with reality. Before I would allow an atheist to judge someone in another society or God or even another person for things they say are morally wrong, I would need them to justify how they can have an absolute standard for morality.

In the same way I would need them to justify any invariant abstract entity prior to them using it.

How can an atheist justify the use of induction? Induction is necessary for any type of learning to take place. Before I can allow an atheist to use any science or “learned” material I would require them to justify induction within an atheist universe. How can matter in motion, as Bahnsen puts it, account for laws?

Bahnsen’s statement about the impossibility of the contrary boils down to the fact that naturalism or any other worldview cannot account for those things that make our lives intelligible. They are internally inconsistent. Naturalism is reduced to blind faith in how they know what they know. Atheists want to and do use logic, induction, and reasoning and yet they have no foundation for its existence. They must use the Christian worldview, in which such things can be justified, in order to argue against God’s existence.

This subject can be explained in much more detail but of course I do not have the time or the space. I hope this is enough to at least give a basic understanding of what pre-supp is.

Peace be with all of you and may knowledge and wisdom find you in good spirits.

Kris

Jack the Bodiless

And here is where many of them lose the argument. They tend to be Biblical inerrantists, and hence Young-Earth Creationists. When the "comport with reality" test is applied, we find that YEC does not comport with reality (the fossil record, radiometric dating, DNA evidence, cladistics etc etc etc).

When confronted with this problem, they attempt the "Wrong-Thinker Escape" (non-Christians are "wrong-thinkers" whose perception and reason cannot be trusted because of their "false" presupposition). Unfortunately this undermines the principle of the "comport with reality" test: if our perception of reality is determined by our presuppositions, it is meaningless and futile to attempt this test.

Thus, the presuppositionist is literally driven into delusional insanity, unable to evaluate perceived evidence from the real world.
No, we criticize Van Til because he did NOT come to the conculsion that God exists by presenting a supporting argument. He began with the assumption that God exists, blatantly ignored all problems with Biblical inerrancy, dismissed a handful of alternate worldviews by constructing strawmen and setting fire to them, then concluded that his initial assumption was correct.
There are two problems with this argument. Firstly, there is no rule dictating that we CANNOT judge other societies by our own standards. And, secondly, there is no reason to assume that there IS an "absolute standard of morality" beyond that of simple pragmatism (i.e. what is necessary for the functioning of societies and the success of the human species). Without a requiremoent for any additional level of "absolute morality" to exist, its lack does not threaten the validity of the naturalistic worldview.
Bahnsen has it backwards. Natural laws account for "matter in motion", not the reverse. We live in an ordered Universe. Theists may claim that a deity is required for the Universe to be ordered, but they need to demonstrate this. The obvious responses to "where did order come from" are "where did God come from" and "where would DISorder come from".
In the atheistic worldview, these stem from the properties of the Universe. In the theistic worldview, they stem from the properties of God. Both foundations are equally valid, except that the Universe has the advantage of definite existence.

Vorkosigan

I just wanted to make a post on this topic.

And quite a long post too! I am glad you stopped by to make it, though. Welcome to the SecWeb. Click on our library link at the top of the page and read some of the articles on presuppositionalism.

need to be justified. If you make any assertion you must be ready to justify that assertion. Atheists make an assertion then make the claim they do not need to justify the assertion. They place upon others the duty of proving them wrong. I could take that route also and redefine theism as, one who finds the atheistic objections inadequate. That wouldn't go over to well though would it?

Well, no, since there is no such thing as "theism." Theists do not agree on anything -- how many gods there are, what their characteristics are, etc. There is no such thing as "theism," only specific theisms. Atheists, on the other hand, all lack a belief in gods. On everything else, they disagree.

Since the theist is the one asserting -- usually here it is a Christian arguing that an obscure Canaanite sky god is the only and eternal god -- that there is a god, then the burden of proof is on her. Simple, really.

The question at hand is, “What is presuppositionalism”? “Pre-supp”, as I will now call it, starts with the worldviews being used by the two parties within the argument. In this case it would most likely be Naturalism and Creation.

Well...That would be metaphysical naturalism, a atheistic belief, but one of many. Your anti-presup might be another Christian, or a Buddhist atheist, or a Confucian, or a hundred others, all atheist, not metaphysical naturalists.

I say worldview because each person can view the same world in light of different presuppositions and get different meaning. Presuppositionalists argue it is pointless to discuss the facts because each side interprets any given evidence according to their worldview and get different results, each side feeling their interpretation is the correct one.

The underlying assertion here is that the two worldviews are incommensurable: there is no way to arrange a test in a place where they both overlap. And that is just plain false.

Within the Christian worldview I assume that the Christian God exists and within the Atheist worldview God does not exist and everything happens through natural processes.

Some atheists, strong atheists, argue that there are no gods. They are a minority even among atheists. The atheist position is that we do not believe in gods. To give an analogy, the Loch Ness Monster may well exist, but I do not believe in her. The strong aNessiest would argue that in fact, Nessie does not exist.

One could make the claim that one must prove God’s existence before making the assumption God exists but an equal claim can be made against Atheists knowledge that God does not exist.

We don't "know" that god doesn't exist. The only thing we know is that there is no evidence that there is such an entity.

The Atheist is, by this, making it impossible to prove God whether He exists or not. By their definition God cannot be proven. No matter what is presented this atheist will not see credible evidence because of his presupposed criteria.

This is a parody of methodological naturalism. Actually, methodological naturalism, as used by metaphysical naturalists, assumes as part of its problem-solving strategy that there are no supernatural causes. Note that this assumption could easily be disconfirmed by the discovery of supernatural events in the course of a scientific observation. Unfortunately for theists, no such evidence exists.

Your pre-supp can also be seen in this very forum. How many of you who criticize van-til and his works have actually read a book about his work and analyzed his findings to see if such things were true or could be true?

Actually, a number of us are reasonably familiar with his arguments, such as they are. Van Til has no "findings" in the sense you mean.

I could venture a guess that none of you have.

And you'd be wrong.

You have presumed, because he comes to the conclusion that God exists he must be wrong and his method must also be wrong.

No, his methodology consists of an extremely erudite version of covering his ears and eyes and shouting "I'm right! I'm right!"

How well does each worldview comport with reality?

You plan to measure this how? You have a better and more reliable method for understanding the world out there than methodological naturalism?

Can each worldview account for those things necessary for intelligibility? Greg Bahnsen called them the preconditions for intelligibility.

Metaphysical naturalists have no trouble accounting for the things necessary for intelligibility.

I come to the table knowing that God exists and an Atheist comes to the table knowing Naturalism is true.

Ummm...no. We come to the table knowing that methodological naturalism is the best way we currently have of gaining useful and reliable knowledge about the nature of the world out there. I don't know in what sense you could call it "true."

Who’s pre-supp can account for those things necessary for our conversations and science?

We metaphysical naturalists don't have many presuppositions, except maybe about the reliability of our senses, same as you.

Kris, not all atheists are naturalists, and not all naturalists are atheists. You seem a little confused about what you are arguing against. You are really attempting to battle metaphysical naturalism, it seems to me.

Pre-supp asks each party to first justify the invariant abstract entities such as the laws of logic, morality, induction, and reason. These things must be justified prior to being used. I have yet to find a way in which they can be accounted for within the naturalist’s universe. Atheists use them but are unable to account for why they are able to do so.

Kris, check out this <a href="http://www.psych.ucsb.edu/research/cep/primer.html" target="_blank">Primer on Evolutionary Psychology</a>

Logic is one of the conditions for complex social interaction. Many animals are capable of reasoning, in varying degree. Even spiders. See the amazing feats of <a href="http://www.sigmaxi.org/amsci/articles/98articles/jackson.html" target="_blank">Jumping Spiders of the genus Portia</a>. There are in fact three professional journals devoted to cognition in insects alone, as I recall.

Logic is rather easy to explain on evolutionary grounds. Why don't you pick something hard, like music?

The most common argument would be one of morality. An atheist claims that morality is socially or individually derived but this restricts all morals to a social or personal environment.

You seem unaware that a number of atheists are objective moralists.

This means that you are unable to judge anything that goes on outside your social environment.

"Suttee is evil." There, I just judged something outside my social environment. See how easy it was?

It means that you are unable to judge the atrocities that happen within other societies.

We need to judge them because.....???

There are no atrocities, simply people doing things different then you.

So that's what Christians think! No wonder they are always killing other people....

Right and wrong lose meaning. Those societies cannot be held accountable for things done as long as they were consistent with their own social morality.

Really? Then how do you explain atheist opposition to evils? How do you explain moral behavior among atheists? How do you account for atheists like myself, who believe there are moral ideals that would make the world a better place if they were universally held?

Morality is reduced to mere opinion and thus one would need to explain why I should refrain from doing what I wish to do?

Why shouldn't you do what you want to do? No one is stopping you.

Why should I comport my views to your opinion of right and wrong.

No reason you should. But since we live together in the same society, it behooves us to try and work out our differences so we can co-exist peacefully. That's why so many of us subjectivists advocate certain moral values over others, because of the positive results.

This view obviously does not work and does not comport with reality. Before I would allow an atheist to judge someone in another society or God or even another person for things they say are morally wrong, I would need them to justify how they can have an absolute standard for morality.

Why do I need an "absolute standard" to make a judgement? I can make a judgement any time I want, about anything I please! "Torture is evil." Oops! Just made another one! How did I do that?

The issue isn't making judgements, Kris, it is justifying them to others in the constant web of social negotiations in which we live. I can say "Capital punishment is wrong" but can I get you to accept that view?

How can an atheist justify the use of induction? Induction is necessary for any type of learning to take place. Before I can allow an atheist to use any science or “learned” material I would require them to justify induction within an atheist universe. How can matter in motion, as Bahnsen puts it, account for laws?

Hmmm...how can colorless atoms have color?

I suggest you review the explanation in Giere's Explaining Science. I'll post a previous post here.

• My Philosophy of Materialism/naturalism
  Let's start out with a one-sentence summary: naturalism, when you come right down to it, is the belief that consciousness cannot operate directly on reality outside the mind.
  
  As far as my particular naturalist beliefs, I am an evolutionary naturalist. Human cognitive capacities are evolved capacities, just like those of other animals. It is undeniable that human abilities are well-adapted to the world in which humans function, and that these capacities are non-trivial. A fantastic amount of processing power is required just to walk or read a poem.
  
  Empiricist philosophers (that's you, SingleDad! ) have emphasized the role of perceptual experience in their analyses of knowledge because of the high degree of subjective certainty attached to such experience. The problem was then to get beyond this subjective experience. From an evolutionary perspective, there's a connection between subjective certainty and the objective reliability of our interactions with the world. Although the evolutionary history of some of these capacities for developing reliable perceptions of world is still in the dark, there's no denying the reliability of our perceptions.
  
  Traditional rationalism has focused on these subjective intuitions we have, that space-time is 3D and that time is linear. These judgements seem to be built into the way we think. Indeed, they seem to be (see Tools, Language and Cognition in Human Evolution), since those aspects of the world relevant to our fitness have that structure. But rationalists, like empiricists, are still stuck with the problem of subjectivity. From their perspective, it seems impossible that one could ever discover what science has indeed discovered, that the cosmos has several dimensions, and so forth.
  
  Evolutionary theory provides an alternative. By looking back at their own evolutionary history, scientists can better understand their own cognitive situation and investigate the development of their own cognitive capacities. We know already that we have reliable perceptions about the world; the problem of induction is really not "how is it we can induct" but "how is it our inductions are so reliable?" The reply to Hume is contained in modern cognitive science, which has shown that inductive capacities are built into humans (and other animals). So are things like logic, the idea that things in the world have intentions, and so on. Most of these originate in the cognitive equipment necessary for competition in our highly developed social world. If you look at this Primer on Evolutionary Psychology you'll get a few simple examples of how logic (in that case, conditionals) operates in human social systems.
  
  In other words, the cognitive view starts with the realization that our perceptions are largely reliable, wonders why this is so, and then uses the tools of science to discover why, confirming that indeed our perceptions our reliable.
  
  Some of you I know are shouting "Hey wait! This is circular!" I would argue, as I think Wittgenstein did, that epistemology has been gripped by the idea that one must prove in Straight Lines. The philosopher reasons from first principles, then, grounded in A, moves on to B. The cognitive scientist starts with B and using B, goes back to find what A is all about. Circularity does not exist here, because at each iteration of the scientific process, something has changed: we have more knowledge about ourselves and the world. This is not circularity, but a positive feedback loop. Using our powerful cognitive abilities made reliable by evolution, we expand our knowledge of the world, thus understanding our own cognitive abilities better. This new knowledge enables us to better understand the world. And so on. As Giere noted in Explaining Science : A Cognitive Approach(Science and Its Conceptual Foundations) "the existence of these positive feedback loops is not a limitation that must be overcome by some special form of philosophical analysis. On the contrary, it is one of the things that makes modern science so powerful."
  
  As for pre-suppositions, I have none, save what mother nature built into all humans (and that is a formidable array). I don't believe that consciousness can directly operate on reality outside the mind, and there is no evidence that it can. That is not a presupposition, but a discovery backed by five centuries of scientific investigation. Western science has failed to show even a single example of it, while refutations of the supernatural in non-scientific formats go back 2,000 years in several cultures. As everyone knows, the supernatural was tossed out of science by theists beginning in the 16th century, who began to understand that it had no ability to explain the world around us. Subsequent investigation shows that the world gets along fine without it.
  
  I don't worry too much about what philosophy says about ontology or epistemology, because those answers are going to come from the cognitive sciences. That has pretty much been the trend over the last 300 years; that the realm of philosophy is being invaded and colonized by the sciences. Although philosophy is incredibly good as a poser of questions for the cognitive sciences to answer.

So those are my thoughts from an old post, Kris. Next time focus on something difficult and complex, rather than induction, like music or art. Now those are interesting. Induction is uninteresting, even animals are born with it.

no foundation for its existence. They must use the Christian worldview, in which such things can be justified, in order to argue against God’s existence.

Fortunately the Christian worldview is so bloody, incoherent, authoritarian, contradictory and fantastic that using Christianity to undermine Christianity is not so difficult.

This subject can be explained in much more detail but of course I do not have the time or the space. I hope this is enough to at least give a basic understanding of what pre-supp is.

Well, it certainly gave us an understanding of what you think a pre-sup is.

Peace be with all of you and may knowledge and wisdom find you in good spirits.

A beautiful thought. The same to you.

Vorkosigan

Steven Carr

You can beg and plead with a pre-supper to attempt to justify morality, logic, reason, induction using his assumption 'God exists'.

However, they have been trained never to attempt to answer the question.

It is , of course, utter gibberish to say that logic must be justified before being used. Total and utter claptrap.

Perhaps pre-suppers can tell us the name of a reputable book on logic, which says , when discussing tools of logic like tautologies 'Of course, I must justify the idea that a tautology is true.'

However, perhaps Kris would like to tell us what induction is. He doesn't have to justify it, or prove that atheists can't justify it. All he has to do is tell us what the problem of induction is.

(Don't hold your breath waiting for an answer)

Kris

My thanks to those that replied to my post. I decided not to respond to every comment but to those that were most pertinent to the topic because of time and length issues.

Actually, everyone makes assertions. The only way you can get around defending an assertion is if you claim ignorance and even that is an assertion of what you don't know. Burden of proof lies with anyone making any assertion. It seems strange for someone who clings to science and proof so strongly to disregard a need to prove ones assertions.

I am glad to hear that, though it confuses me as to how you can be familiar with his arguments and still make some of the claims you do.


I would like to know how you can justify objective morals without God.

Well I have learned something. I didn't know about the jumping spiders of the genus portia. This does not explain how logic is justified and explained within your worldview. I know logic exists. Explain how it can exists within an atheist universe.


Again, I see that it is possible to do however I do not see your justification for it. It is my contention that you must borrow from my worldview to do such things because your worldview can not account for objective morality. If I am wrong please justify how objective morality can exist within your worldview.

You just indicated that it is your belief that "Suttee is evil." You just made a judgement. Ask yourself why it is nessesary to judge. If someone kills your mother or brother do you feel a need to make a judgement. Was it our place to judge the actions of Hitler? Why? If right and wrong are reduced to mire opinion why should anyone condemn something like rape?
I do not believe rape is a neutral act and I condemn it but I have an absolute standard in which I can justify condemning it.

It isn't, how I can explain these things but how can the Atheist? You need to explain how an Atheist can do these things because again it is my contention that you must borrow from my worldview to do such things because your worldview can not account for them. I could be wrong but I have not heard anything justifying them within an Atheistic worldview.

Because you have to be able to justify why you are right. If no absolute standard exists then nothing is trully wrong and nothing is right. Everything is based on opinion. If everything is based on opinion how can you come to the conclusion that your opinion is any better than the opinions of others. How are you better than Hitler? You can not justify why your belief is better than that of someone who feels torture is great.
And how did you do that? Isn't that amazing. I think you were able to do that because God exists and you borrow from my worldview where things such as absolute morality has a foundation and can be justified.

This is what Van-Til has taught.

I am sorry but this is not correct. The laws account for the order yes but that isn't the point. You still need to account for laws within your naturalistic universe. Within a universe where there is only "matter in motion" how can you justify the existence of these laws? These account for the order within the universe. You don't get laws from order you get order from laws.

I appreciate the time you spent responding to my post. I did not agree with most of it however it did give me a better understanding of what an atheist holds to. I do not intend to categorize all Atheists. I tend to argue against the Atheistic worldview that seems more internally consistent. I understand that other views exist and I apologize for categorizing.

Peace be with you all and may your lifes pursuits lead you to happiness and a sense of fulfillment.

Kris

Steven Carr

No we don't need to justify the existence of these laws. Utter bilge. Nature works just fine without us having to 'justify' it.

Steven Carr

You will notice that Kris , as a presupper, cannot attempt to explain why 'God says so' justifies anything , let alone morality.

But he is trained to avoid answering those questions.

If morality is simply God's opinion, then what gives God the right to say that his opinion is better than anybody elses?

Kris

Steven Carr
Sorry, you posted while I was posting so I missed responding to you. It is dissapointing that you have such an anger but I thank you for your response and hope that my response will be meaningful to you.

I am asking you to justify it right now. If any Atheist can justify it please do so. You spent your time saying that I can't prove that an Atheist can not justify it though I noticed that you provided no justification yourself.

When using the pre-supp "God exists" how can I justify those things that make life inteligable. My worldview states, “In the beginning God” and the Atheist worldview states, “In the beginning matter” which can explain those things that make life intelligible? If an orderly logical reasoning God exists it would make sense that His creation would show these attributes as well.

What is induction?
Induction is the process in which you take a specific experience and you project the results of that experience to similar possible experiences in the future. For example if you were to burn your hand you could come to the general conclusion that fire burns your hand. Without induction you could not make such an assumption. How can a worldview of random natural processes account for induction?

It seems like everyone here is very good at attacking but not explaining how these things can be accounted for within their own worldview.

Thanks for the reply.
Kris

[ May 28, 2002: Message edited by: Kris ]</p>

Steven Carr

Kris writes 'If an orderly logical reasoning God exists it would make sense that His creation would show these attributes as well.'


Kris says 'it makes sense'. Perhaps Kris would like to justify that statement without engaging in circular reasoning. He cannot. His very presuppositions rely on naturalistic logic to even get started.

In fact, he cannot even read the Bible without relying on naturalism to give him a true account of what he is reading.

Kris believes that there are supernatural agents who want to deceive him. How then can he justify what he sees? He believes both that Satan tries to deceive him when he reads the Bible and that he can read the Bible accurately. These are quite contradictory beliefs - just one manifestation of the contradictions inherent in his world view .

And why does it make sense that the attributes of God are exhibited by a creation of God? Van Gogh had a heart and lungs, yet none of his paintings had hearts and lungs.

What rule says that the creations of a creator must have the same nature as the creator? There is no such rule. There has never been such a rule, and there will never be such a rule.


Kris's 'justification' is simply an ad hoc rationalisation with no sense or logic to it at all. He is simply making things up.


Nor would I attempt the stupid task of saying that the past determines what the future brings. That is a pure assumption, which I am quite happy to abandon if it turns out to be wrong. As Kris (blinded by presupp propaganda) does not know, induction is not part of an atheistic 'worldview' - it is simply an hypothesis, and one which is amply justified by experience.

His equally stupid claim that atheists think both 1) there are natural laws and 2) the universe works by random processes , simply demonstrates that he has no knowledge of naturalism. How can any rational person think that naturalists believe both that natural processes work randomly and that there are natural laws?