"However statistically improbable the entity you seek to explain by invoking a designer, the designer himself has got to be at least as improbable."
This quote comes from page 138 of the paperback edition of Richard Dawkins' bestselling book "The God Delusion." Mr. Dawkins concedes that the existence of the universe is improbable, but he accepts its existence (largely because we live within it). We see the universe all around us, so it somehow must have overcome these odds (for anyone who wants to get hyper-technical, yes, I realize that he goes on to discuss the anthropic principle as a means to overcome the improbability, but it is just that, a way to overcome the improbability; this is still conceding that the universe's fine-tuning is improbable). But Mr. Dawkins rejects the existence of God based upon the even larger improbability. After all, Mr. Dawkins has never seen God as he has seen the universe, so he has no reason to believe that God has overcome the improbabilities.
Mr. Dawkins' argument misses the distinction between entities that exist within time and those that exist outside of time, but that is not the point of this post. Instead I wish to point out a rather humorous implication of the specific sentence I quoted above.
Bearing in mind that I have never seen Mr. Dawkins (just as Mr. Dawkins has allegedly never seen God) let's take Mr. Dawkins' statement again with a few insertions to clarify his meaning:
However statistically improbable the entity you seek to explain by invoking a designer (i.e., the universe), the designer himself (i.e., God) has got to be at least as improbable.
The conclusion = God does not exist.
Now allow me to use the same logic, but use it to try to explain the existence of the finely-tuned book "The God Delusion" instead of trying to explain the universe. After all, the combination of letters that come together to form the complex thoughts in "The God Delusion" are extremely improbable, so I am proposing that they were designed by Mr. Dawkins. Using Mr. Dawkins' own statement we get:
However statistically improbable the entity you seek to explain by invoking a designer (i.e., "The God Delusion"), the designer himself (i.e., Richard Dawkins) has got to be at least as improbable.
The conclusion = Richard Dawkins does not exist.
I am sorry to say Mr. Dawkins, that you have apparently disproven your own existence, at least to anyone that has never met you personally. I guess "The God Delusion" came together randomly after all, despite the odds.
16 comments:
I’m curious—do you really not understand the point being made regarding improbable statistics, or do you understand it and attempt to make fun of it?
If the former—unfortunate. If the latter—cute, but you probably out to explain the humor, as most Christians would take it as a serious argument.
I thought I pretty clearly mentioned that I did understand his point ("yes, I realize that he goes on to discuss the anthropic principle as a means to overcome the improbability") and that I believe the point is actually quite weak ("Mr. Dawkins' argument misses the distinction between entities that exist within time and those that exist outside of time"). But as I also mentioned, "that is not the point of this post."
I also hoped that I was clear that I was simply trying to point out a "rather humorous implication." It was just an attempt at light humor and I did not claim that I was giving anything resembling a structured response to Mr. Dawkins' underlying argument (aside from my passing comment about time).
If there was any confusion, allow me to be clear. This was only a humorous anecdote pointing out that by substituting terms in Mr. Dawkins' comment I could conclude that he did not exist. Nothing more, nothing less. Of course, anytime you have to explain a joke, it loses its humor, so I guess that one has fallen flat.
Ha ha. I was caught by Poe’s law. *grin*
On a related note, though, how you propose to calculate statistical probabilities on an entity that exists “outside of time.” (Considering “probability” is a determination of how likely an event is to occur within time.)
I don't. My point would be that the alleged "improbability" that Dawkins proposed would not apply to an entity that exists outside of time for exactly the reason you mention.
Then it is odd you use the fine-tuning argument (which is based upon statistical probability) to prove a God exists, when you say statistical probability would not apply to an entity that exists out of time (presumably meaning God.)
Which is it? Can we use statistical probability to prove a God, or can we not?
No. I use the cosmological argument (i.e., Big Bang) to prove that a cause to the universe exists. I used the teleological argument (i.e., statistical probabilities) to prove that it is intelligent.
The cosmological argument shows that the cause exists and that it exists (or is at least capable of existing) outside of time. The teleological argument (fine-tuning) looks at the work that cause has done within time. Any work that is performed within time is subject to statistical probabilities to demonstrate the likelihood of it being intelligent.
The arguments can go somewhat hand in hand because obviously if there is an intelligence behind the universe then there must be a cause for it. But the point is that the teleological argument (i.e., statistical probability) only looks within the universe. Based upon the teleological argument alone,I guess the cause of all the fine-tuning could be within the universe itself. It is the cosmological argument that looks outside of the universe.
We get different pieces of the puzzle from different places.
If you can’t use statistical probabilities to even determine a God exists; what do you use to come up with statistical probabilities of what a God would do?
Leave aside whether or not it is "God" we are talking about. We are analyzing something within the universe and therefore within time; i.e., the fine-tuning. You said earlier that "'probability' is a determination of how likely an event is to occur within time." Is the fine-tuning "an event [occurring] within time"? Yes, it is. Therefore it is subject to an analysis of statistic probability.
It is perfectly appropriate to analyze whether or not the fine-tuning is statistically probable without some intelligence playing a part. That's all the teleological argument does. If God acts within time, then His actions are just as subject to statistical analysis as anything else that happens within time. The fact that those events are caused by God does not somehow take them outside the realm of time.
Let me use the following example to explain what I mean. How persuasive is the following argument:
“It is impossible for us to determine whether President Obama has a half-brother. But if we assume he does, then there is an 80% chance the half-brother jogs 2 miles every day.”
Do you see how the first sentence completely undercuts any force—any substance—in the second? We can’t even determine the existence of this half-brother; let alone speak with any authority as to the half-brother’s exercise routine.
And the situation with God is worse. At least in reality we know half-brothers and jogging actually exist. Here we have the theistic concept that God is so incomprehensible, so unverifiable, so dissimilar and incongruous with any thing our minds can fathom, that we cannot come up with any possible way to have a statistical probability he even exists.
Not that the statistical probability of a God is extremely low. Rather, it is completely foreign to the idea of proving a god exists. Like asking, “What weighs more—the color blue or the square root of -1?” A nonsensical concept.
Yet once the theist chooses to assume a God exists, they know so much about this God (a God a second ago they couldn’t give even the remotest possibility of a hint of a suggestion of a statistical probability of even its existence), they can provide precise statistical probabilities as to what it does or does not do.
Further, the attempt to parse out the cosmological argument from the fine-tuning argument regarding statistical probability and events occurring within or without time is equally unpersuasive. Both utilize events within time to make determinations regarding God. The cosmological argument uses the known universe (which involves time), cause and effect (which involves time) and the events happening from time=0 to the 1st Planck second (which involves time.) The fine-tuning equally deals with events happening from time=0 to the 1st Planck second. Arguably, God would not have to “fine-tune” anything but that 1st Planck second—the rest would fall into place.
What we skeptics see are theists utilizing contradictory concepts within their arguments for God, or their God’s characteristics. You claim you cannot use statistical probabilities to prove a God, because God is “outside” time, yet use time-based concepts to prove a God as part of the cosmological argument. Not the whole, true, but it is still part.
Then, when you desire statistical probabilities, you assume there is a God, and suddenly have the ability to make determinations of what this God will or will not do. Can’t use statistical probability to prove its existence, since God is so different, but CAN use statistical probability as to what God will do, because it is so similar to us.
Look, I am not trying to convince you there is no god. I don’t even care whether you see the incongruities in your arguments. What I do care about is that you begin to see—maybe get a hint—as to why your arguments are not very persuasive to skeptics. It is not because I would have to give up gambling, drinking, premarital sex, greed and countless other vices.
It is that in your first breath, in order to prove your God, you place him so far out of reach as to be completely unknowable, and in your second you tell us all the things he must/must not do.
All right. I was trying to avoid getting into this type of detailed discussion by not really getting into the merits in my original post and by speaking only in generalities in my previous comments. But because we’ve managed to get here anyway, here goes…
I believe I can sum up the problem with your argument by using your opening example. You began your illustration by saying, “It is impossible for us to determine whether President Obama has a half-brother.” The extrapolation to what you allege the theist argues is that we are conceding, "It is impossible for us to determine whether God exists." You even went on to say that I “assume” God’s existence. That is not what I said at all. I believe it is definitely possible to “prove” God’s existence. I just believe we do so as a matter of logical probability, not statistical probability. And I pose this question to you: Since when are statistics the only way to know something?
Take the following example. A person who has a positive stool occult blood test has a 3% to 5% chance of having colon cancer. This means that in the research we have done, we have observed “x” number of people who have had this test. By following these people 3% to 5% of them turn out to have colon cancer.
It is this type of analysis that I do not believe can show the existence of a timeless God because of our inability to calculate statistical probabilities outside of time. In other words, we cannot say, we have observed “x” number of complex things in existence. By following these things, we have observed that y% of them turned out to have been designed by an entity that exists outside of time. We cannot see outside of time, so we cannot possibly have observed this phenomenon in the same way we observed people with colon cancer. Therefore, we cannot use this type of statistical analysis to prove either a timeless God’s probability or His improbability.
This means that God is not completely knowable, meaning we cannot know everything there is to know about Him. However, that is not the same as saying (as you claim theists say in your comment) that God is completely UNknowable. That would be saying that we cannot know ANYTHING about God. Saying that we cannot know everything is not the same as saying that we cannot know anything.
Statistics can play a role in demonstrating God’s existence, but it is not in the type of analysis I outlined above. Instead, it is by virtue of their contribution to an inductive argument, the teleological argument (and even in that circumstance they only show the existence of an intelligent designer, saying nothing about whether that designer is inside or outside of time).
Admittedly the teleological argument is sometimes phrased in a deductive manner as follows:
P1 All complex, finely-tuned entities are designed.
P2 The universe is a finely-tuned entity.
C The universe is designed.
Norman Geisler phrases it this way in his “Systematic Theology.” A skeptic, though, would be justified in challenging premise 1. After all, how do we know that all complex, finely-tuned entities are designed? Ultimately, premise 1 is an inductive conclusion. This is why I believe the teleological argument at its core is really an inductive argument.
P1 All complex, finely-tuned entities that we have measured have been designed by an intelligent agent (or you could rephrase this, if you think you have counter-examples, by saying 90% or 99%, etc. of complex finely-tuned entities that we have measured have been designed by an intelligent agent).
P2 The universe is a complex, finely-tuned entity.
C The universe is likely to have been designed by an intelligent agent.
Notice that unlike the deductive conclusion, an inductive conclusion makes no claims to absolute certainty. It is phrased in terms of probability, much like the statistical analysis of colon cancer I cited earlier. The difference is that the word “God” does not appear anywhere in my inductive conclusion, nor does the concept of time. Statistics play a role in our inductive argument because they provide the justification for premise 1 (unlike the unsupported first premise in the deductive form of the argument). But notice that unlike trying to use statistics to prove the existence of a God who is outside of time (which I have conceded is a practical impossibility), here the statistics have nothing to say about whether the designer exists inside or outside of time. All we conclude from the inductive argument is that something exists that has interacted here within time. The fact that another, completely separate argument (i.e., the cosmological argument) happens to show that this designer is at least capable of existing outside of time does not diminish this argument in any way.
Also, please note that I am not conceding that statistics do not apply outside of time. It is simply that we lack the ability to measure them. This is the problem I illustrated above. We cannot see outside of time, so we cannot possibly have observed the likelihood of a “God” phenomenon in the same way we observed people with colon cancer. However, that is not to say that a theoretical timeless entity could not measure these probabilities.
God may exist outside time, but obviously on at least one occasion He acted inside time; i.e., to finely-tune the universe. It is in regard to that action and that action alone that we can use statistics to determined whether or not an intelligent agent underlies it.
I will close with the following illustration. Assume you are in a locked room with no windows and only one door. You cannot see or hear anything outside the room. I tell you that there is a person standing on the other side of the door. Please tell me whether that person is male or female. You would have no way of knowing the answer because you cannot see that person. Now assume that person walks through the door and enters the room. I then ask you the same question. Now you can answer me. Why? Because that person has entered the room, thus allowing you to examine him or her.
The distinction you draw is like saying that we cannot statistically analyze God because He is standing outside the room. If God had remained outside the room I would agree. But He didn’t. When he finely-tuned the universe He stepped inside. Maybe not completely. Maybe He just stuck His leg in. But even then you could analyze the leg. You could tell me His shoe size, for example. The mere fact that you cannot see his head (because it is still outside the room) does not somehow limit your ability to analyze His foot (which is inside). Similarly, the mere fact that God exists outside of time does not mean that we cannot statistically examine whatever He has placed inside.
So ultimately I believe you are attacking the method of the argument rather than the merits. You are saying that the theist cannot argue for God in the manner in which he is doing so because statistics cannot measure the probabilities of a timeless entity. But the distinction you attempt to draw does not hold up. When God took action to finely-tune the universe, He took that action within time, not outside of it. He, in effect, stuck His leg into the room. That leg is now subject to statistical analysis just like everything else that is within the universe (and therefore within time). Can we conclude everything there is to know about God based only upon His “leg”? No, of course not, which is why I conceded that we cannot prove the existence of a God outside of time based upon these statistics. The evidence of fine-tuning has nothing to do with time (unlike the evidence from the Big Bang). But that concession does not mean that the evidence of fine-tuning does not show us, by way of an inductive conclusion, that some intelligence must have designed all these indescribably specific settings. And that, ultimately, is all the teleological argument was meant to do (which is why, incidentally, it eventually convinced Antony Flew that God exists, but only took him as far as deism, not theism).
I hope that goes into sufficient detail to make my points clear. God bless.
Ken
I apologize, Ten Minas Ministries. I cannot seem to find the appropriate words to explain why this type of argumentation does not persuade a skeptic. Why we find it incongruous. Maybe it is my fault; maybe yours; maybe nobody’s.
If I had to guess at the root cause, it is that the theist and the non-theist approach the argumentation surrounding Gods from two very different perspectives. Until we can learn to appreciate the other’s way of looking at things, we may not understand why our arguments fail to be convincing. It appears to me the theist approaches it from a “top-down” whereas the skeptic is looking at it from a “bottom-up” approach.
When theists argue for a God, they already have a God in mind—their own. I understand (I really, really do) that is not what the theist thinks they are doing, but in the end their own biases affect the argumentation. The cosmological argument is to demonstrate a God creating the universe. Yet the Muslim is thinking this proves Allah; the Jew—YHWH; the Hindu—their God, and so on. When the theist moves on to the fine-tuning argument; they almost subconsciously “insert” their own God, with its own peculiarities, as being proven. Each “—ical” argument, although claiming to present a general argument, is—in the theist’s mind—proving their God.
Since they already believe a God exists (specifically their own)—they utilize whatever points to a God, never realizing some of the points appear contradictory. There is a God (their own) and anything that points to this God must be true. Minor incongruities can be brushed aside with, “we don’t know—God is incomprehensible.”
By “top-down” I mean the theist, as they sincerely believe in a God, look for evidences to prove what they already know is true.
A non-theist, on the other hand, approaches from the “bottom-up.” Since we have no particular God—in fact, no God at all—we look for what the proofs demonstrate as to whether there is a God and what that God would look like.
Take the cosmological argument. I won’t bother to point out the issues with the argument; anyone can peruse the Internet and discover the various responses on their own. The conclusion the theist comes to is that the universe must have been created, and since the creator is not a part of the universe, it consists of characteristics unlike the universe. If I recall correctly, Dr. Craig indicates since the universe has time; the creator must be timeless. Since the universe has space; the creator must be spaceless. Since the universe has matter; the creator must be matterless. (And curiously energyless, although I don’t recall him specifically mentioning this one.)
You only refer to time in your article, as near as I can tell.
O.K., if we are persuaded by the cosmological argument, we look the underlying method; that the contents of this universe (time, space, matter, energy) are NOT reflective of the creator. In point of fact, they are the opposite (timeless, spaceless, matterless, energyless). Since the creator is OUTSIDE the universe. Otherwise, according to the theist, if the creator operated with time, space, matter, etc.—it would be IN the universe. (An attempt to avoid pantheism.)
The next step, almost invariably, the theist turns to is the fine-tuning argument. You do yourself. *grin*. Now, all of a sudden, we utilize the concepts and items within the universe to demonstrate what the creator is like. (A claim we see complex items made by designers, the universe is complex, so it probably has a designer.) This 180-degree turn is so fast, it gives the skeptic whiplash! Here is where our “bottoms-up” approach causes us to see incongruity:
Cosmological Argument: What is in universe is NOT reflective of a Creator.
Teleological Argument: What is in universe IS reflective of Creator.
We see this as a switching of methods; a way to maintain a God by jumping from argument to argument, changing the method and the means at each jump in order to maintain the God the theist believes in.
If you don’t mind, I will spring off the analogy you used of an unknown person in a room. The problem with analogies, as you know, is that we are attempting to analogize something (God) the theist readily admits is not like anything we know (is unique) and is unverifiable (more on that in a minute.) You indicate we don’t know whether the person is male or female.
But this assumes something—that there are only two sexes. See, just like the theist starts to interject their own belief as to their god (a designer, a purpose, etc.) within the arguments for God, this analogy starts to inject its own assumptions—that there are only two sexes.
Remember, we are attempting analogize a God. If we had a God behind the door, we don’t know whether it is male, or female, or a different sex we don’t know about, or no sex at all, or male AND female (if it is polytheistic). We have no way to answer a question as to what sex a
God is behind that door.
You go on to give us some hints as to the person behind a door. It displays a leg, or walks in the room. Again, this assumes it has a leg or can walk. Subconsciously, the theist does the same thing—presumes certain aspects of its God, and interjects them into the arguments for God.
O.K., we don’t know what is behind that door. But the theist claims it gave us “hints” as to what it is, so we can extrapolate characteristics about it.
What are those hints? Simple—our known universe. Yet we go back to the same problem I outlined before—the same universe the theist claims demonstrates what is behind that door is nothing like the universe (timeless, etc.), the theist subsequently claims that same universe demonstrates what is behind the door IS like our universe.
Skeptics see a problem with this.
Now let’s plug this back into our statistical probability. Using the universe as the basis for the cosmological argument, you indicate it is practical impossibility to prove the existence of God. O.K., got it. Proving the barest, most elemental, most basic fact about God—its very existence—it is impossible to use statistical probability. But once you assume a God, the very thing that cannot be used to prove it, is MORE than sufficient to prove characteristics about it? Sure, you can claim the one time God acted “in time” (creating the universe) is why we can use statistical probability, but it seems to me, in the cosmological argument, you indicated the one time God acted “in time” (creating the universe) we CANNOT use statistical probability. Same moment (creation); two different arguments—two different methods.
Maybe I can demonstrate it this way—(being the eternal optimist I can somehow get it right.)
The fine-tuning argument is a comparative argument. You use comparative terms—“More reasonable,” “more likely.” We are comparing the odds:
Supernatural: 1,000:1
Natural: 10,000:1
There, supernatural wins, because it is “more likely” to have occurred. In your article, you go through a number of occurrences we observe in the universe to come up what a statistic. One, for example, is 10 to the 99th power to 1 as to probability of earth supporting life. (Based on Hugh Ross.) Great. But that is just a statistic. It doesn’t tell us anything. Presumably this would mean the naturalistic explanation would have 10^99:1 odds of occurring.
Where, in your article (since I to compare odds) do you give the statistical odds for this supernaturally occurring? We have:
Supernatural: ???:1
Natural; 10^99:1
See, the hidden, untold statement that the fine-tuning argument always presents is that since the Natural number is SO HUGE, surely the Supernatural number must be smaller. Yet the Supernatural number is never given! Never compared.
So my question would be this—if you can use “statistical probability” to determine characteristics about God, what factors other than what natural uses do you utilize to demonstrate the Supernatural odds of this occurring are less than 10^99:1? Remember, you can’t even use statistical probability factors to prove God’s existence, using the universe, but now you can come up with statistical probability facts about this God that are…what?...”outside” the universe?
Three final points.
1. I apologize for the use of the term, “impossible” in my analogy—I couldn’t think of a better term to analogize to the “practical impossibility” to use statistics to prove God’s existence. If you think of a better way to phrase, I would have been happy to use it.
2. Ten Minas Ministries: You even went on to say that I “assume” God’s existence. That is not what I said at all.
I meant for purposes of the fine-tuning argument you already assume God’s existence. I derived that from your article where you say:
Ten Minas Ministries: Because of the cosmological evidence (explored in detail in the previous article), I start with the assumption that a creative entity does exist.
3. Ten Minas Ministries: This means that God is not completely knowable, meaning we cannot know everything there is to know about Him. However, that is not the same as saying (as you claim theists say in your comment) that God is completely UNknowable. That would be saying that we cannot know ANYTHING about God. Saying that we cannot know everything is not the same as saying that we cannot know anything.
The problem is that theists don’t know what they don’t know! To coin a phrase from Donald Rumsfield—what you know or don’t know about God is an unknown unknown! Theists can’t agree whether they know God initiated the Big Bang and stopped, or interjected throughout history, or didn’t even use a Big Bang at all! Theist’s don’t agree as to whether they “know” God used intelligent design, theistic evolution, OEC, YEC, multiple creations, etc. They don’t even agree we know whether God communicated to humans, let alone agree as to what method, let alone agree as to what writing!
Not only do theist not know some things about God, they cannot know where that line is as to what they DO know about God. Do they know 50%? 10% 1% Ten things? Five Things? One thing? Take five different theists, and you can get 20 different answers as to what that line is!
At what point does something practically become unknowable? If the ONLY thing we can say about God is that it initiated this universe, does that really provide much information? Once theists begin to extrapolate from there, they begin to disagree wildly as to what we “know” about God.
I wish I was a better communicator. I wish, for an instant or two, you could see the world as my brain sees it, and could understand why these arguments are not persuasive. I wish you could see we are not atheists because we like to gamble—but that we have thought about these things you say and fail to be convinced by them.
“The cosmological argument is to demonstrate a God creating the universe. Yet the Muslim is thinking this proves Allah; the Jew—YHWH; the Hindu—their God, and so on. When the theist moves on to the fine-tuning argument; they almost subconsciously “insert” their own God, with its own peculiarities, as being proven. Each “—ical” argument, although claiming to present a general argument, is—in the theist’s mind—proving their God.”
I can only encourage you (and anyone else reading this) to read the articles on the Ten Minas website under the Argument for Christianity heading. I have never claimed that either the cosmological nor teleological arguments prove the existence of the “Christian” God. In fact, in those articles I explicitly deny that they do so. I also explicitly denied it in my comments above. To give just one example, toward the end of my last comment I stated:
“The evidence of fine-tuning has nothing to do with time (unlike the evidence from the Big Bang). But that concession does not mean that the evidence of fine-tuning does not show us, by way of an inductive conclusion, that some intelligence must have designed all these indescribably specific settings. And that, ultimately, is all the teleological argument was meant to do (which is why, incidentally, it eventually convinced Antony Flew that God exists, but only took him as far as deism, not theism).”
I have always argued that the teleological argument only proves the existence of intelligence. You are correct that it does not show whether this intelligence is Yahweh, Allah, or Brahma. Given my repeated statements along these lines, what exactly would you need before you concede that I am arguing from the “bottom-up” as you put it?
“Minor incongruities can be brushed aside with, “we don’t know—God is incomprehensible.””
To my knowledge I have never brushed aside a logical contradiction by saying “God is incomprehensible.” It is one thing to say that we cannot fully understand God, but this does not mean that God can be logically contradictory. I have yet to see any incongruities, minor or major, pointed out to me that turn out to truly be incongruent.
“The conclusion the theist comes to is that the universe must have been created, and since the creator is not a part of the universe, it consists of characteristics unlike the universe. If I recall correctly, Dr. Craig indicates since the universe has time; the creator must be timeless. Since the universe has space; the creator must be spaceless. Since the universe has matter; the creator must be matterless.”
Obviously I would need to see an exact citation to Dr. Craig to fully respond, but the way I have phrased it in my article is actually that the Creator (or more appropriately the “cause”, because that is really as far as the cosmological argument can take us) is CAPABLE of existing outside of time, matter, etc. Logically we cannot conclude that it MUST solely exist outside of time because the mere fact that an entity can exist outside the universe does not mean that it cannot exist within it as well (at least this is true based upon the Big Bang alone; the logical argument against an eternal regression would get us there).
“Cosmological Argument: What is in universe is NOT reflective of a Creator.
Teleological Argument: What is in universe IS reflective of Creator.
“We see this as a switching of methods; a way to maintain a God by jumping from argument to argument, changing the method and the means at each jump in order to maintain the God the theist believes in.”
Your conclusion does not follow from your premises. You have committed the logical fallacy of equivocation: using the same term to mean two different things. In your first sentence, “a Creator” refers to that entity’s substance. In your second statement “a Creator” refers to that Creator’s actions.
To be accurate, the two points should be re-written as follows:
Cosmological Argument: What is in the universe is not of the same substance as the Creator.
Teleological Argument: What is in the universe is reflective of actions the Creator has taken.
Your point about the cosmological argument deals with who the Creator is. The teleological argument deals with what that Creator has done. The way you phrased it, you assumed both dealt with who the Creator is; i.e., the Creator’s substance.
Allow me to build on the analogy a bit. This time, instead of standing in a room, you are a fish in a fishbowl. You cannot see outside the fishbowl. Suddenly, a giant net comes into the water, scoops out your best fish-friend and takes him away. Now an outside human observer would see that there is a person on the other end of that net scooping out that fish, but the fish doesn’t know that. The fish only sees the net.
The net certainly isn’t of the same substance as the person holding it. The net consists of a long metal stick with some kind of fibrous mesh on the end. The person is a carbon-based life form. These are certainly not the same (i.e., the cosmological conclusion). But does that mean that the fish (assuming the fish had human-level reasoning abilities) could not draw any conclusions about the person on the other end of the net simply by observing the net? Of course not.
Imagine, for example, if the fish sees his friend frantically trying to get away from the net, but with every turn the friend makes, the net makes a turn to match. Imagine if the net could be seen employing a strategy to trap the fish-friend in a corner. Without ever actually seeing the human being on the other end of the net, the fish could conclude that the net was being driven by some kind of intelligence. The fact that the fish may concede that the intelligent agent is not also made up of a metal stick and fibrous mesh does not affect its ability to draw that conclusion. Your point is comparing apples and oranges.
“The problem with analogies, as you know, is that we are attempting to analogize something (God) the theist readily admits is not like anything we know (is unique) and is unverifiable (more on that in a minute.)”
And for that reason it is not possible to come up with an analogy that FULLY describes God. But that certainly does not mean we cannot come up with an analogy that accurately depicts some part of His character or some action He has taken. God as a whole may be unique, but we certainly can find plenty of examples in our reality that partially describe Him, and as long as that part is the relevant part to the conversation, the analogy is valid.
“But this assumes something—that there are only two sexes.”
This seems to me to be a red herring, irrelevant to the point we were discussing. Pick anything. I don’t care what. The point was that unless that person somehow enters the room (or to use my fish bowl example takes some action that effects the inside of the room) you cannot draw any conclusions about him or her. Use gender, hair color, or literally anything else about that person (including whether or not the person even exists). The specific “gender” example has no bearing on the conclusion of the analogy.
“…the same universe the theist claims demonstrates what is behind that door is nothing like the universe (timeless, etc.), the theist subsequently claims that same universe demonstrates what is behind the door IS like our universe.”
Not true. See the fish bowl example above. The theist never claims that the person is of the same substance as the net. But that does not mean we can not learn about the person from the net.
On a related note, when did the theist ever claim that the intelligence that exists within the universe cannot exist outside the universe? This logical fallacy is sometimes called “hasty generalization.” You draw an unjustified generalization from specific examples. In other words, you assume that because some things that are characteristic of our universe cannot exist outside of it, nothing that is characteristic of our universe can exist outside of it.
So time, matter and space do not exist outside our universe. Why does that mean intelligence cannot? If the teleological argument was being used to claim that time, space or matter existed in the Creator, you would have a stronger argument, because those are the attributes that many theists claim do not exist outside the universe. But the teleological argument is not used for any of these conclusions. It only claims to show that intelligence exists outside. Where is the contradiction here?
“…you indicate it is practical impossibility to prove the existence of God.”
That’s not what I said. I said that it is a practical impossibility to prove the statistical probability of a TIMELESS God based upon the fine-tuning evidence. I never claimed that it was impossible to show the logical probability of God’s existence, and in fact that is the point of the series of articles on the website. There is far more evidence than simply the fine-tuning. Fine-tuning shows one piece of the puzzle. Other evidence gives us the rest of the pieces. All I conceded is that the statistical probabilities of the fine-tuning do not show that God is “timeless.” They show that SOMETHING exists, but based upon the fine-tuning evidence alone this “something” could be either within time or outside of time.
“Where, in your article (since I to compare odds) do you give the statistical odds for this supernaturally occurring?”
Who says (again, based upon the fine-tuning evidence alone) that the intelligence needs to be “supernatural”? Yes, I have come to that conclusion myself, but NOT BASED ON THE FINE-TUNING EVIDENCE. The comparison for the purposes of fine-tuning is intelligence versus non-intelligence. Properly, then your comment should read:
Intelligent: ???:1
Non-intelligent: 10^99:1
Here are some examples from my article in which I discussed the odds of intelligence causing this type of result:
“So the question that confronts us, based upon the evidence, is whether a naturalistic explanation could reasonably account for overcoming the odds against life in our universe. The answer to this question lies in our analogy with the 1915-penny. Lets say you want to put that penny in a jar. How will you be more likely to get the penny in the jar, by blindfolding yourself and randomly picking out one of the 100 pennies, or by looking at each penny individually and hand-selecting the one from 1915? The first method would be the same as a naturalistic cause for the universe. You just blindly pick a penny and hope you get lucky. The second requires intelligence. Which would be more likely to get you the correct penny? If you say the second (which is obviously correct), then you have to concede that intelligence is also the more likely explanation for the fine-tuning of the universe.”
“A better illustration using the lottery would be to suppose one of your friends walked up to you the day after the lottery and showed you a piece of paper on which he had written all the winning numbers from the previous evening. He then tells you how much he regrets not buying a ticket last night because he accurately guessed all the numbers ahead of time, and he could have won millions of dollars.
“Now you don't know whether your friend really predicted all the right numbers ahead of time or if he just wrote down the winning numbers after he checked this morning's newspaper and is ‘pulling your leg’. If he is telling the truth, then this really was a chance event. But if he got the numbers out of the newspaper, then he used intelligence.
…
“So when all our information comes after the fact, the best we can do is ask ourselves, ‘What is the more likely explanation?’ In this case, is it more likely that your friend actually wrote down all the numbers ahead of time, or is it more likely that he got them out of that morning's paper? Obviously, the latter is the more likely scenario. This leads to the inevitable conclusion that intelligence is also the more likely explanation for creation. Is it possible that your friend wrote down all the numbers in advance? Of course it is. People win the lottery all the time. But it is not the more likely scenario. And the odds of randomly bringing together everything we need for life in our universe are far worse than the odds of winning the lottery.”
Do I give specific statistical ratios? No. That’s no t the point. The point is to illustrate what we reasonably conclude from our everyday lives. It is an existential question. What types of conclusions do you find to be reasonable in other aspects of your life? What are you willing to accept elsewhere without having to resort to some advanced statistical analysis? It isn’t some mathematical formula. People don’t whip out a scientific calculator and figure out the odds for every action they take in their everyday lives. When faced with these same two options in other arenas (i.e., accepting seemingly insurmountable odds or concluding that intelligence was responsible instead) people come to the intelligence conclusion without demanding specific calculations. You aren’t going to ask someone to calculate the odds of your friend forging the lottery paper the next day. You know that it is a more likely explanation through your day to day experience. It is a question of whether or not people are living consistently.
“Remember, you can’t even use statistical probability factors to prove God’s existence.”
Again, I CAN use statistics to prove the probability of an intelligent agent’s existence. All I conceded is that these fine-tuning statistics cannot prove that the agent is timeless.
“2. Ten Minas Ministries: You even went on to say that I “assume” God’s existence. That is not what I said at all.
“I meant for purposes of the fine-tuning argument you already assume God’s existence. I derived that from your article where you say:
“Ten Minas Ministries: Because of the cosmological evidence (explored in detail in the previous article), I start with the assumption that a creative entity does exist.”
Again, this is the logical fallacy of equivocation. Same term, different definitions. You seemed to be using the word “assume” to mean a starting assumption without independent support. In my article I used it to be saying (in essence), “because I already demonstrated that this cause exists in the last article, I assume its existence for the starting point of this article.” I “assumed” it because I had already demonstrated it to be true with the cosmological evidence. I simply wasn’t going to be re-hashing it again. I think the sentence you quoted makes that point pretty clear.
“Theists can’t agree whether they know God initiated the Big Bang and stopped, or interjected throughout history, or didn’t even use a Big Bang at all! Theist’s don’t agree as to whether they “know” God used intelligent design, theistic evolution, OEC, YEC, multiple creations, etc. They don’t even agree we know whether God communicated to humans, let alone agree as to what method, let alone agree as to what writing!”
Does Richard Dawkins agree with all other atheists about every single point? Do you? Do all scientists agree on every nuance of their specialty? Every argument must be assessed on its own merits. English astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle coined the term “Big Bang” as a way to ridicule the theory. Because astronomers do not all agree does this mean we cannot “know” it? Theists agree on the fundamentals and may differ on the peripherals. But as Mr. Dawkins said in “The God Delusion”, some opinions are just wrong. The fact that there is disagreement on a point does not make it unknowable.
“I wish, for an instant or two, you could see the world as my brain sees it, and could understand why these arguments are not persuasive. I wish you could see we are not atheists because we like to gamble—but that we have thought about these things you say and fail to be convinced by them.”
I understand your frustration. The problem for me, though, is that when I analyze atheistic arguments I see them making some very basic logical errors; errors that I do not believe would be made when speaking of anything other than God. In this comment alone I have pointed out two examples in which you engaged in equivocation and another in which you resorted to a hasty generalization. These are classic logical errors of which I am sure you are aware. You stated that you “really” understand that theists honestly believe they are arguing from the bottom-up and not top-down. I leave it to other readers to discern whether I have really pre-ordained the existence of the Christian God in any of my arguments. But are you willing to accept the possibility that you may be doing the same thing you suggest of theists? Are you willing to acknowledge the possibility that maybe you are committing logical fallacies that you would not commit in other arenas precisely because (perhaps unconsciously) you do not want to accept the conclusion? I am not asking you to accept anything you have not already ascribed to the theistic camp. Just food for thought. Is it possible that the shoe is really on the other foot?
God bless you Dagoods.
Ken
This is why I shouldn’t bother arguing with Christian apologists. I am eternally optimistic they can see the other side. Forever doomed to disappointment seems to be my lot.
I will only point out one problem to demonstrate why these are useless conversations and retreat to other endeavors.
To avoid my concern regarding a changing of methods, you are forced to re-define what you claim the fine-tuning argument is, in order to dismiss my concern under the false accusation of the logical fallacy of equivocation. If this is what we have come to, there is really no need to go any further.
I shall demonstrate why I say this:
Is “timelessness” what an entity is or what an entity does?
Is “intelligence” what an entity is or what an entity does?
I would say both “timelessness” and “intelligence” are what an entity is--not what an entity does. They are characteristics of the entity; yes—they may result in certain actions of the entity, but the essence—the concept, the idea—is a characteristic of the entity.
We would say “God IS timeless” or “God IS intelligent” to portray and explain and describe a God. (Again, we could, in addition, say “God acts timelessly” or “God acts intelligently”—but this is a necessary result of the character condition of God.)
I pointed out the concern of how the cosmological argument utilizes the universe (what the theist claims God did) to make the claim because the universe has certain parameters, God’s character must not. I.e.—because the Universe has time, God must be timeless. I pointed out how the fine-tuning argument then utilizes the universe (what the theist claims God did) to make the claim because the universe has certain parameters, God’s character must. I.e.—because items perceived as complex require intelligence God must be intelligent.
Same set of facts: the Universe.
Different methodology: Universe has it; God’s character does not vs. Universe has it; God’s character does.
You indicate this is an equivocation, because the cosmological argument deals with “who the creator is” whereas the fine-tuning argument deals with “what the creator has done.” Your words:
Ten Minas Ministries: Cosmological Argument: What is in the universe is not of the same substance as the Creator.
Teleological Argument: What is in the universe is reflective of actions the Creator has taken.
Your point about the cosmological argument deals with who the Creator is. The teleological argument deals with what that Creator has done. The way you phrased it, you assumed both dealt with who the Creator is; i.e., the Creator’s substance.
First of all, I could point out that the cosmological argument ALSO deals with what the creator has done (i.e.—created!) but the more important issue is the new claim the fine-tuning argument deals with what the creator has done.
While that may be part of the fine-tuning argument (just as it is part of the cosmological argument) the fine-tuning argument is attempting to claim a characteristic of God. Namely intelligence. The cosmological argument attempts to make a claim about God—namely it is eternal or timeless and “outside” the universe; the fine-tuning argument attempts to make a claim about God—namely it is intelligent.
How did I use a term to mean two different things? Which one of these two arguments does NOT make a claim about a characteristic of God, derived from the data set of the universe?
Let’s look at your own comments in this thread. Are you talking, when referring to the fine-tuning argument, of what a creator DID or what a creator IS? (emphasis added)
Ten Minas Ministries: But the teleological argument is not used for any of these conclusions. It only claims to show that intelligence exists outside.
…
The comparison for the purposes of fine-tuning is intelligence versus non-intelligence
…
…then you have to concede that intelligence is also the more likely explanation for the fine-tuning of the universe.
…
This leads to the inevitable conclusion that intelligence is also the more likely explanation for creation.
…
Again, I CAN use statistics to prove the probability of an intelligent agent’s existence.
…
Any work that is performed within time is subject to statistical probabilities to demonstrate the likelihood of it being intelligent.
…
C The universe is likely to have been designed by an intelligent agent.
…
It is in regard to that action and that action alone that we can use statistics to determined whether or not an intelligent agent underlies it.
…
But that concession does not mean that the evidence of fine-tuning does not show us, by way of an inductive conclusion, that some intelligence must have designed all these indescribably specific settings. And that, ultimately, is all the teleological argument was meant to do…
…
I have always argued that the teleological argument only proves the existence of intelligence.
Look at the words you use—“Intelligent agent” (describing an agent’s characteristic) or “it being intelligent” (not “it did intelligent things.”)
Yes, as PART of the fine-tuning argument, we could argue this agent did intelligent things, but also part is that this agent IS INTELLIGENT! Something you now must claim is an equivocation in order to dismiss my concern as a logical fallacy.
Or look in your article (emphasis added):
Ten Minas Ministries: Specifically, knowing that there is a creator to the universe, how do we know that the creator is an intelligent entity?
…
If the entity is intelligent, it is not a "natural" phenomenon (as we are using that term in this context).
..
The primary evidence for an intelligent causal entity comes from what is known as the "fine-tuning" of the universe.
…
Now we just want to know if that "something" is intelligent…
…
Now we want to learn a bit about that "something", specifically, whether or not it is intelligent.
…
The difference between God and an inflation field is that God is intelligent, whereas an inflation field is not.
…
When we are deciding whether to accept inflation theory, then, we need to ask ourselves whether we have evidence that the causal entity for the universe is intelligent.
…
Obviously, if our universe is the only one in existence, the evidence is overwhelming that its cause was an intelligent agent.
…
I have one final note on the evidence for an intelligent creator.
…
We know that there is an intelligent agent out there somewhere that is responsible for creating the entire universe.
…
This is an intelligent that is capable of action.
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This intelligent agent created everything you see.
…
An intelligent, eternal, creative God exists.
Over and over and over and over you refer to the agent’s characteristic as being “intelligent.” You use the phrase, “God is intelligent.” NOT “God does intelligent things.”
But when an atheist dares to rely upon these statements and say, “Hmm…looks to me as if the fine-tuning argument is making a claim about what God is” and that turns out to be a problem for the Christian apologist…why, lo and behold and smack my chickens…the Christian apologists informs the atheist, “Shucks, NO, the fine-tuning argument is not about God being anything. Why, that would cause a change of methodology I would have to recognize. The fine-tuning argument is about God doing something.”
How dare I “assume the fine-tuning argument dealt with who the creator is”? (paraphrase of your words) No one, in reading your comments or article would EVER be led to the conclusion the fine-tuning argument is making ANY claim as to who the creator is. Why, things like “God is intelligent” isn’t a claim about God—no, siree—that is a claim about what God does. (Bit o’ sarcasm there.)
The saddest part is this long diatribe is a wasted effort. You still won’t see it. You will equivocate, and vacillate and avoid and obfuscate and justify how I must have committed some type of logical fallacy of equivocation by assuming the fine-tuning argument is making a claim about what the creator is. Or that the cosmological argument is not using what the creator did.
Still fun to write. *grin*
Yes, Ken, I am keenly aware of the possibility of my own biases. I would be a fool to see it in other humans and fail to recognize I could do the same. Unfortunately, Christian apologists can only discuss with me from their own parameters (e.g., that I don’t believe in a God because I want to commit vices) and utterly fail to understand it from my perspective.
Therefore, in order to determine those biases—I must look elsewhere than conversations with Christian apologists. They start off from the wrong perspective, refuse to acknowledge their own mistakes, approach it from an unrecognized bias and provide the same, tired shell game of changing definitions to dismiss my concerns.
I think you are a good person; totally and completely sincere in your belief. You and I—we see the world so very differently. I sometimes hope a lurker will pause, seeing an atheist on a Christian’s blog, and reflect on those differences, perhaps taking a step towards understanding them. I don’t want people to deconvert. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
I just wish Christians could—for a moment—understand their case is not so “airtight” as they would like to believe. There really are rational, cohesive questions from skeptics as to the strength of these arguments. We really do not believe in a God because we reasoned to the conclusion.
Not because we gamble on NCAA basketball brackets…
Dagoods,
Allow me to clear up some apparent confusion. You are correct that "timelessness" refers to what an entity "is." But, as I have said before, that is irrelevant to our discussion. The teleological argument has absolutely nothing to say about the timelessness of whatever caused the universe.
You are also correct that "intelligence" refers to what an entity is. I am not claiming otherwise. When I referred to "what an entity does" I was speaking of the actual action of fine-tuning. That action occurs within the universe. The intelligence may lie either inside or outside the universe (based solely on the teleological argument), but the action is very clearly on the inside.
This should dispose of the bulk of your comment, because you seemed to be operating under the false assumption that I was arguing that the teleological argument could only tell us about the creator's actions, not His substance. I don't believe I have ever said this, but to the extent I may have caused some confusion, I apologize. As I will illustrate momentarily, I think my fish bowl example made my point very clearly. I believe that the fine-tuning (i.e., the action that occurs inside the universe) is the BASIS by which we make a judgment about the Creator's substance. Whereas in my colon cancer analogy we could make a judgment by direct observation (i.e., we could see the people who developed colon cancer) we cannot use direct observation to make a judgment about the substance of a timeless entity because we cannot see outside time (This is why the fine-tuning evidence cannot be used as a means to conclude that the fine-tuner is timeless; All the evidence for fine-tuning exists within time so it cannot even speak to the issue of timelessness). However, this just limits the MEANS by which we can make such a judgment about the Creator. It does not mean that we cannot make any judgments whatsoever.
We cannot directly observe an entity that exists outside our universe. But we can see what that entity has done within our universe, and on that basis draw some conclusions about its substance. This is precisely what I was illustrating with the fish bowl. The fish cannot see the person outside the bowl holding the net. But by observing the NET (i.e., not directly observing the person, just as we cannot directly observe the Creator; but by observing the action that the person outside the fishbowl has taken within the bowl) the fish is able to come to the conclusion that whatever is on the other end of that net is intelligent.
So to be clear, yes, I am saying that the teleological argument derives a conclusion about the substance of the Creator; i.e., what the Creator IS. But it does so by means of what that Creator DOES.
Hopefully that clears up that little point.
Now to your point about the alleged inconsistency between the cosmological and teleological arguments.
I have brown hair and blue eyes. I provide you a data set of people with black hair and ask if that data set applies to me. No, it does not. I now present you with a data set of people with blue eyes and ask you if that data set applies to me. Yes, it does.
Now let's take it one step further. Both "people with black hair" and "people with blue eyes" are within the data set of "things that exist within the universe." Let us substitute that data set for the ones we discussed earlier. In regard to hair we have said, "things that exist within the universe do not apply to Ken Coughlan." In the eye example we have said, "things that exist within the universe do apply to Ken Coughlan." Are these now contradictory conclusions? Of course not, because in reality I have not been using the same data set at all. I have two separate sets, both of which are subsets of "things within the universe" but neither of which makes up the whole. Some things that exist within the universe may describe me and other things may not.
This is the hasty generalization fallacy that you continue to make. You say that the teleological and cosmological arguments rely upon the same data set; i.e., the universe. Could you possibly have defined your data set more broadly? Does the teleological argument's data set include EVERYTHING within the universe? No, it does not. It ONLY includes intelligence. That's it. Nothing else. Does the cosmological argument's data set include EVERYTHING within the universe? No it does not. It includes, time, space and matter, but excludes non-material things like the concept of intelligence.
Not only do these two arguments use different data sets but there isn't even the slightest bit of overlap between them. Essentially the form your argument takes is:
P1: Space, Time and Matter are not reflective of the Creator.
P2: Space, Time and Matter are elements of the Universe.
C: All elements of the universe are not reflective of the Creator.
Because intelligence is also an element of the universe, you conclude that it cannot be reflective of the Creator (or more specifically that the theist is being inconsistent in claiming that it is). It is again the hasty generalization fallacy.
I also stand by my position that you have committed equivocation in conjunction with the hasty generalization, but perhaps after your latest comments I better understand where that equivocation lies. I misunderstood your earlier comparison when you said:
“Cosmological Argument: What is in universe is NOT reflective of a Creator.
Teleological Argument: What is in universe IS reflective of Creator.”
I thought your equivocation lay in the term “Creator.” I thought you were claiming the theist was arguing that the fine-tuning itself was somehow part of the Creator's substance as opposed to an action He had taken. However, based upon your latest comments I see that your equivocation actually lies in the phrase “what is in the universe.” In your sentence about the cosmological argument this refers to time, space and matter. In relation to the teleological argument this refers to intelligence. These are all things that are "within the universe", but they are certainly not the same thing. Having stood corrected, I now rephrase your sentences as follows:
Cosmological Argument: Time, space and matter are NOT reflective of a Creator."
Teleological Argument: Intelligence IS reflective of a Creator.
Properly rephrased, it becomes clear that there is no contradiction.
If you think about it, there is a clear distinction between these elements as well. Time, space and matter are the building blocks of the universe. They describe its composition. The theistic cosmological argument you discuss therefore states that these three things cannot describe the composition of God. Intelligence is something that exists within the universe, but it is not part of its composition. It is not one of the building blocks, so to speak. It may have been used to piece the "lumber" together, so to speak, but it is not the lumber itself. It is the difference between building materials and the tools used to assemble them. God cannot be made of the same building materials as the universe, but that does not mean He cannot have some of the same tools.
Whatever caused something to exist cannot be ontologically subject to it. The Creator cannot be confined to existing inside the universe because He/it must be ontologically separate from the universe. Because time, space and matter exist within the universe, the creator cannot be confined to those attributes. That is not to say it cannot enter into its creation after it is created. After all, a builder must be capable of existing outside the house he has built because he ontologically (and in this example also temporally) pre-existed it. But that does not mean he cannot walk through the front door once it is finished.
The form of the cosmological argument is also different from the teleological argument. The argument from design uses the attributes of the universe as its evidence to prove intelligence. The cosmological argument does not. The key point for the cosmological argument is that the universe has a beginning point. It thereafter follows that the Creator cannot be confined to the building blocks of the creation, WHATEVER THOSE BUILDING BLOCKS MAY BE. In our case it is space, time and matter, but the precise identity of those building blocks is completely irrelevant to the cosmological argument. Whatever they are, the Creator must be ontologically independent of them. You can hardly say that the identity of the finely-tuned attributes is irrelevant to the teleological argument. It is the specific nature of those attributes that makes the entire case.
Dagoods, I do not doubt for one moment that you have reasoned yourself to atheism. I do not stand here claiming that you are an atheist simply because you are a thrill seeker and want to "roll the dice." I am also sure that your de-conversion process may have been quite painful for you. You have reasoned your way to atheism, but you have done so with incorrect reasoning. You have accepted logical errors along the way that I cannot believe you would accept in other arenas. I cannot imagine that in any other venue you would possibly dream of defining a data set as "the whole universe," thereby quite literally including virtually everything possible, and fail to see that there are many subsets within that data set.
You have committed logical errors. If you will not accept insight into your biases from a Christian apologist, well...I'm sorry. From this "side of the table" it looks like you are closing the door to someone who makes you uncomfortable for the very reason that they make you uncomfortable.
"They start off from the wrong perspective, refuse to acknowledge their own mistakes, approach it from an unrecognized bias and provide the same, tired shell game of changing definitions to dismiss my concerns." Who is this statement speaking of, the theist or the atheist? Dagoods, you are the one who changed the definition of "what is in the universe," not me. You are the one not recognizing your bias. You are the one who is not seeing the classic logical errors made in your argument. I know I probably haven't been this direct with you before, but it is because I care for you, whether you believe that or not. Your own comments are pointing you to the way you should go. In your effort to describe the Christian apologist, you have unwittingly described your own argument almost to a "T".
As for why you are not seeing all this, I am not going to presume to say. That is between you and God. I've been where you are before. I grew up in the church, but when I went to college I began to think I was above it all. Christianity may have had some benefit to help people feel good, but it really had no rational support. I stopped going to church. I didn't pray. I wouldn't even speak Jesus' name out loud because I thought I'd look like some uneducated fool.
I was wrong. It's hard once we become entrenched in any belief system to work our way out of it. We are always afraid of what other people might think of us. I know I was terrified of what people would think of me if I openly bought in to all this Jesus stuff. I can only imagine that the situation is far worse for you. After all, you've put yourself out there as a pretty outspoken atheist. All I can ask is that you take a look back at all the conclusions you draw and ask yourself if you would draw those same conclusions if we weren't talking about God. Do this by yourself. Any time we let the public in we always become concerned about what everyone else will think. Spend some time in quiet reflection, and if you want to talk privately, you can always e-mail me through the web site.
God bless you.
Ken
Ten Minas Ministries,
It is a free internet. You are at liberty to ascribe whatever motivations you desire to my decisions. *shrug*
In looking back, I feel a bit rude for intruding into your blog. I have attempted to point out where we skeptics are coming from but have clearly failed.
I will assume all the blame for the lack of motivation to respond and move on.
Please never feel rude for "intruding." You are always welcome here.
Ken
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