Category: science

Book Plunge: Irreligion Chapter 13

Does complexity require complexity? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

John Allen Paulos is a thoroughly dishonest individual.

As we saw when discussing the design argument, he argued that complex things need a complex designer. One would hope an honest individual would keep that standard. Alas, they might, but Paulos is not such an individual.

We are skipping chapter 12 in case you are wondering as there is nothing really in there counting as an argument that needs to be addressed. Before we get to this point, let’s look at something amusing Paulos says:

The obstinate blindness to contrary facts that confirmation bias induces in some religious people always reminds me of the little ditty by William Hughes Mearns: As I was sitting in my chair, I knew the bottom wasn’t there, Nor legs nor back, but I just sat, Ignoring little things like that.

Paulos, John Allen. Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up (p. 109). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

I can’t help but be amused when someone who makes basic mistakes about the other side and doesn’t address any scholarship at all talks to us about confirmation bias. Confirmation bias works both ways. I regularly engage with Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormons, and atheists. I also ask them when the last time they read something that they disagreed with was and usually, I get absolutely nothing.

But moving on:

The last cognitive distortion I’ll discuss is a form of primitive thinking related to the availability error. It is best characterized as “like causes like.”

Paulos, John Allen. Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up (p. 111). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

Got it, so it is a form of primitive thinking to say in order to cause something, the cause must be like the effect. Good to know.

It is perhaps not surprising therefore that people have long thought the complexity of computer outputs was a result of complex programs.

Paulos, John Allen. Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up (p. 111). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

Okay. So you can have a complex output, and yet that doesn’t mean that the program that produced it was complex. Does that mean it could be simple?

Although it’s not a new idea, no one has treated the notion of simplicity leading to complexity with the thoroughness of Stephen Wolfram in his book A New Kind of Science. The book is twelve hundred pages, so let me focus on Wolfram’s so-called rule 110, one of a number of very simple algorithms capable of generating an amazing degree of intricacy and, in theory at least, of computing anything any state-of-the-art computer can compute.

Paulos, John Allen. Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up (p. 112). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

Okay. So here Paulos is talking about the idea that simplicity can lead to complexity. Not only that, but apparently this is something scientific. Let’s keep going.

Simple programs, he avers, can be used to explain space and time, mathematics, free will, and perception as well as help clarify biology, physics, and other sciences. They also explain how a universe as complex-appearing and various as ours might have come about: the underlying physical theories provide a set of simple rules for “updating” the state of the universe, and such rules are, as Wolfram demonstrates repeatedly, capable of generating the complexity around (and in) us, if allowed to unfold over long enough periods of time. The relevance of the “like causes like” illusion to the argument from design is now, I hope, quite obvious. Wolfram’s rules, Conway’s Life, cellular automatons in general, and the Mandelbrot set, as well as Kauffman’s lightbulb genome, show that the sources of apparent complexity needn’t be complex (although they usually are).

Paulos, John Allen. Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up (pp. 114-115). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

And this is how the chapter ends.

So apparently, a complex program can come about from something incredibly simple.

Unfortunately, when he talked about the design argument and the complexity of the universe, Paulos said the exact opposite. None of this simplicity stuff was there. There was no correction of Richard Dawkins at all.

Keep in mind as I pointed out, we have already observed that Paulos will lie for fun to trick people out of money. Paulos is not just ignorant of what he writes about. He is dishonest about it and has confessed to dishonesty for pleasure that leaves real victims before.

Have nothing to do with this individual. Do not buy his book. I am going through it so you won’t have to. If you meet anyone interested in his work, send them here.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

 

 

Book Plunge: Irreligion Chapter 10

Do you believe in miracles? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

This chapter is on evidences from miracles, prayers, and witnesses. Well, he has certainly done his homework. He has a grand total of TWO miracle claims. Wow. That’s certainly impressive isn’t it?

Let’s suppose I said this to someone like Paulos.

“Today, I am going to examine the case for evolution. My cases are going to be built around Piltdown Man and the Archaeoraptor. Both of these were accepted by some and yet turned out to be frauds. With a history like that, we can obviously say evolutionary theory is a bunch of garbage.”

I suppose a reply to that by someone holding to evolution would be, “But if you’re going to examine evolution, you need to examine all the evidences for it, and not just the ones that you think you can easily show to be frauds. True research requires much more than that.”

They would be absolutely right.

Of course, I’m not trying to argue against evolution with any of that. I have no stance on the issue and I don’t care about it. I am simply saying two cases does not really count since you can pick ones you think you can easily demonstrate to be false and then move on thinking you have done everything.

At any rate, the two stories he chooses are the accounts of a Mother Drexel in 1955 and the Fatima sightings of 1917.

After saying these are what he’s going with, he tries to define a miracle. So far, so good. I do agree with him that a miracle is not just an unlikely event. Paulos is of the position that if someone seemingly being rescued is a miracle, then what happens with those who died? If someone recovering suddenly of a disease is a miracle, is contracting it in the first place also one?

For the former, I would be hesitant to say a miracle had necessarily taken place just because someone survived or was found alive. For the second, if someone has a spontaneous recovery in a religious context after something specific such as prayer, I am inclined to say a miracle has taken place. He asks why it isn’t a miracle if a parapet cracks at 3:06 AM and falls on the head of the only person walking on the street below. (Never mind why are you walking on the street at 3:06 AM?) My answer is sufficient for that.

For the Mother Drexel case, he says two children prayed to her after she died and experienced spontaneous recoveries. He says that such can happen anyway, and that’s true, but that doesn’t demonstrate his point here. Coming up with an alternate explanation does not disprove one explanation or even show the alternate is likely. For Fatima, he says the prophecies were vague. Maybe they were. At any rate, it doesn’t look like he did any real study on the matter and there are plenty of other miracles throughout history and in our present time he could have pointed to.

Then he says this:

In all these cases, believers always have an out in the “God of the gaps,” whose performance of miracles, although consistent with natural laws, exploits the ever-decreasing gaps in our scientific knowledge.

Paulos, John Allen. Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up (p. 87). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

But this could be just as easily turned around on Paulos. I could say he has a naturalism of the gaps. If there is a gap in the reasoning, well, we know it can’t be a miracle because miracles don’t happen because naturalism is true. God of the gaps with theism is weak reasoning, but it is just as weak with naturalism.

Of course, he also points to David Hume, completely unaware for instance that umpteen responses and more have been written in reply to Hume. There were plenty Paulos could have looked at, but that would require that he seriously engage with contrary thought, and we just can’t have that. He could have even read the agnostic John Earman.

Tomorrow, we’ll see what he has to say about Jesus and other figures.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

 

 

Book Plunge: Irreligion Chapter 4

Do improbable events just happen all the time? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

In this chapter, Paulos is taking on the anthropic principle. Now as readers know, I’m not really a science guy so I’m not going to try to approach it from that angle. Seeing as he is a mathematician, I am going to try to give Paulos the benefit of the doubt on the math, despite I think I have great reason to distrust him, which we will get to later.

At the start, Paulos says this:

1. The values of physical constants, the matterantimatter imbalance, and various other physical laws are necessary for human beings to exist.

2. Human beings exist.

3. The physics must have been fine-tuned to the constants’ values to make us possible.

4. Therefore the fine-tuner, God, exists.

Paulos, John Allen. Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up (p. 28). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

Little problem at the start. For one, this is quite simplistic. Second, does Paulos interact with any scientists who advocate this? No. There are secular scientists as well as Christian ones who have written on this. Where is their work cited? Not here.

He does at least mention Lee Smolin, who hypothesizes a theory of universes breaking off from other universes, a sort of Darwinian theory of a multiverse. The problem is even if this is true, how does this help? I am trying to explain one universe and you are suddenly going to say there are countless universes. It’s like a police officer trying to explain one dead body only to be told that there are 500 more out there and he thinks, “Oh. Well, I guess we can close up and go home then.”

From here, he goes into something called a Doomsday argument. Honestly, I’m looking at this and wondering what this has to do with the price of tea in China. He says that this kind of thinking makes more sense than various end-times scenarios held by many religious people. Perhaps it does, but Paulos assumes that all Christians hold to those kinds of end-times scenarios.

So let’s review. Has Paulos really interacted with the science behind this argument? Not for a moment. Has he looked at the philosophy used by some philosophers as well to explain why our existing in this time and space is unlikely? Of course, he hasn’t. Instead, Paulos has decided to punt to the subject of math and I suspect hope that in the end, none of us will notice that he has not interacted with any of the relevant material on the anthropic principle, and keep in mind I say this as someone who is not scientifically inclined and thus does not use the argument.

Paulos is unfortunately the kind of atheist who likes to do magic where he thinks he can say a few words and wave away a problem with his position. If these kinds of shallow answers seem convincing to him, that tells me more about his atheism than it does about his arguments. Atheists who want to take their worldview seriously should distance themselves from Paulos and encourage other atheists to do the same.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Book Plunge: Irreligion Chapter 2

Is there design? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

One of the problems atheists have with design arguments is they think all of them are meant to be scientific arguments. If anything, the classical teleological arguments are more arguments of order. There is science in the sense that if you do A, B will follow, That does not require any of our complex science today.

It could be that Paulos gets closer to the idea when he starts out chapter 2 this way.

The trees swaying in the breeze, the gentle hills and valleys, the lakes teeming with fish, are all beautifully exquisite. How could there not be a God?

Paulos, John Allen. Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up (p. 10). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

Actually, this is a good argument I think. Beauty is a powerful pointer to God. These are all material objects but there is something that transcends the matter somehow. It is interesting that normally atheists deny objective beauty.

Unfortunately, Paulos throws out any serious study of the argument by saying its best proponent is probably Paley. The problem is while Paley’s argument has a point to it, it is not at all something someone like Aquinas or Aristotle would have in mind by teleology. For those two, you could just have something like an iceberg floating in water and you could have the argument.

To make matters worse, Paulos then just goes on to argue Richard Dawkins’s Boeing 747 argument about how the creator has to be more complex. Why? Paulos I am sure holds to evolutionary theory which says the complexity we have today arose from simpler lifeforms. Why does he change it when it comes to God?

Not only that, but classically, Christianity has held that God is absolutely simple. (Of course, that would require that Paulos actually studied what he talked about.) I look at the argument and think that Paulos doesn’t know what he’s talking about immediately. Even if he did disagree with that approach, as even some Christians do, he should at least mention some Christians hold to divine simplicity.

But let’s look at how this goes for Paulos.

Suppose he claims complex things need a designer.

If so, then we have to ask how we have anything here since evolution is not a designer. If the reply is that not all complex things need a designer, then one could hypothetically say that God is also one of those things. I find that weak, but if Paulos can beg a question, why not the rest of us?

Paulos also tries to use the free market as an example of something without an intelligent designer, but as my friend David Marshall said in his Amazon review of the book:

Really bizarre is his illustration of how the Free Market accomplishes all kinds of complex planning without a Planner. Paulos goes on and on about this, citing Adam Smith and thinking he has scored a great point by cleverly citing an icon of conservatism. This is a “stunningly obvious” example of evolution working by itself, without need for a designer.

But of course, the free market involves millions of intelligent designers. Maybe that doesn’t matter to Paulos’ illustration, but that, too, ought to be “stunningly obvious,” and again, he ought not to just ignore this stunningly obvious fact.

So far, Paulos’s book is just awful.

But oh dear reader, it’s going to get much worse.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

 

 

The Importance of Wonder

Do we live in a society that values wonder today? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Several years ago, Josef Pieper argued that leisure was the basis for culture. He meant by this more than that we should go and have fun. He meant that we should be free to contemplate and appreciate reality and celebrate. In the later chapters, he especially emphasizes wonder.

Wonder is something our society has lost. We are told we need to live in the real world. We are told that some beliefs are often childish. Some people say “In a scientific age, how can anyone believe XYZ?”

He explains that science can in a sense explain everything about the material world. Philosophy, meanwhile, will never exhaust a single fly. It will always be asking questions, and this is not a downside. If anything, it puts science in a worse position because if you can explain everything about the universe, and if matter is all that there is, you hypothetically can, then what else is there.

Consider the question that came up in the Supreme Court nominee hearings a few years ago. What is a woman? Part of us laugh because the answer is so basic, and from a scientific perspective, it is. However, from a philosophical perspective, that is a deep question. One of the most profound questions you can ask about anything is what it is.

Wonder is the state when we are held in amazement by something. We realize that there is something greater than just the material composition of the thing in question. A young man can easily describe the body of his female lover, but he knows there is something greater before him than just her body.

In our age, it has become common to think that if you explain something scientifically, then that means there can be no otherworldly elements to it. However, Socrates, in a Peter Kreeft book where Socrates shows up at a modern college, is told the sun is not a god because we know it is a big ball of gas and fire. Socrates asks “How do we know that that is not what the god’s body is?” It could be that both are true. They’re not, but this is a hypothetical.

Dan Barker describes having his Christian brother drive with him and try to explain the wonder of the mountains. In response, Barker gives a scientific explanation of how mountains come to be. His brother says that he just has to ruin everything, but what kind of response is that? Could it be that yes, this is how mountains come to be, but yet there is still something wondrous about them?

I find one of the tragedies of Richard Dawkins is that he is truly a brilliant scientific writer. There is no sarcasm in that. When I have read some of his writings and he talks about science, it is a marvel. I find myself getting excited about the world of animals especially that he is describing. The problem is that he then wants to dispense of all these silly theistic ideas and then kills the very wonder that he has just described. As is said in An Atheist Defends Religion:

For religionists, therefore, the scientific worldview desacralizes nature, leaving it like a machine to be observed and manipulated, rather than an object of reverence as a creation of God. For this reason, the scientific response disappoints religious believers. Looking up to the night sky and feeling the immensity of existence is only the beginning of the religious quest for transcendence. For believers, wonder has to be met with oneness, a sense that the universe embraces them. But science does not provide a satisfactory way for believers to feel at home in the universe. That is why so many people turn to religion.

Sheiman, Bruce. An Atheist Defends Religion: Why Humanity Is Better Off with Religion than without It (p. 159). DK. Kindle Edition.

Now is this to say we need to dispense with the scientific enterprise? God forbid! It has done a marvelous benefit to mankind and MUST be kept up. The problem is if you make it ultimate, you will kill the wonder. We are meant to study and learn about the material universe, but the material universe is not the end. It is a pointer to something greater than itself. A finger is good for pointing to the moon, but woe to the man who mistakes a finger for the moon.

We should indeed scientifically study the fly, but let us never stop philosophizing about it either.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Why Do Christians Doubt Science?

Why are so many Christians skeptical of science? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

When I say Christians, let me be clear at the start that I am speaking largely of lay Christians. There are several devout Christians in the sciences. Also, I do not think a lot of Christians doubt everything in science. Most Christians still cook food using tools of science and drive cars and travel by airplane.

Yet somehow, it seems there is an increase in the skepticism of claims of science.

In all honesty, I’m one of them also.

Why?

There are two great tragedies I think have happened in scientific history. The first is that there was a false warfare started between science and religion. This meant people had to choose one or the other normally. Atheists would ignore anything religious and quickly dismiss it and miss out on eternal life from a Christian perspective. On a more pragmatic level, there are Christians with great minds who could have gone into scientific fields, but were told they had to choose science or Christianity.

On the other hand, Christians bunkered down a lot more in their own circles and didn’t invest enough in the scientific enterprise. They perpetuated a myth that had been started. Christians could have been doing wonders in science, and yet the warfare continued. Christians got injected with a heavy dose of scientific skepticism.

The second great tragedy I consider far worse for the scientific enterprise.

That was when science married politics.

At least, on the outside looking in, that’s what it looks like.

Let’s go back to 2020 and the Covid controversy going on. Narratives were controlled then. If you said the virus came from a lab in China, you were a racist and a conspiracy theorist. Now, that is accepted truth. Many of us were skeptical of masks and school shutdowns. Looking back, it seems that we were right.

Any mention of hydroxychloroquine was off-limits, especially since it was espoused by the bad orange man. The same happened with Ivermectin. I remember active debates with people who were arguing that people were being encouraged to take horse medication.

Then the vaccines came out. I thought that would be the end of it. I was wrong. Suddenly, you didn’t just need the shot, you needed several boosters of the shot. We were also told if we didn’t get a shot, we were a danger to those who had got the vaccine somehow. It made no sense to us.

Not only that, anything contrary was quickly shut down. Yes. We saw the emails between Fauci and Collins and others. We saw that the science was being controlled and if you dared raise questions, you were anti-science.

And yet, many of us thought raising questions was what science was about.

Many of us also knew people who suffered long-term side-effects from the vaccine. Those stories were ignored as well. The information was being controlled and people would be punished somehow on social media. I remember making a joke post about what the best place was to farm for vaccines on Final Fantasy IX only for Facebook to automatically put up something on my post about contacting the CDC.

Now let’s talk about global warming also.

Many of us have seen threats of doom and gloom and the funny thing is, every prediction in the past that the due date has arrived, it has proven false. I remember being taught in Elementary school back in the 80’s that an ice age was coming. Leonard Nimoy talked about it back in 1979.

Now imagine if we had done something radical back then and taken steps to warm the planet. Where do you think we would be today with the hysteria? The problem many of us see is that the solution is always the same and well, it always seems to come down to more government control and more power for politicians.

Funny how that works out.

We also see all these celebrities talking about the crisis and we all need to cut back while they fly off on their private jets. We see politicians talk about the oceans are about to rise and then they buy oceanfront property. It always seems like the environmental stuff is what everyone else is supposed to do.

By the way, none of this is allowed to be questioned either.

You can also add in transgenderism where we’re told to deny basic biology. It is interesting that it seems to be abortion where people don’t want to look at the science the most and really turn philosophical. It may be a baby, but is it a person? Again, all of this seems tied to one end of the political spectrum.

For me, I can say that since Covid, I have grown a lot more suspicious. We have also seen in our political news how quickly stories get covered up and buried. Many of us do get suspicious.

This is ultimately why many Christians, and also many non-Christians are skeptical today. It’s not because we’re hiding thinking our worldview is in danger. It is because that science often seems to be science tied to an agenda. We live in an age where people are questioning narratives and if science seems married to a narrative, they will question whatever aspect is tied to it.

Until the average layman can tell that the two are not married, they will question whatever aspects of science seem tied to that union. Will this have worse consequences down the line? I am sure it will. Sadly, for many of us, it looks like the enemy came from within.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

 

Book Plunge: Anarchy Evolution Chapter 8

What does believing entail? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

A surprising statement in this chapter is that Graffin doesn’t like the word natural. He says that in a sense, everything is natural. There are some problems with such a statement. If we don’t know what natural means, what does it mean to say everything is natural? Second, if we don’t know what it means, how could we know that everything is natural? Finally, if you are equating natural with what is real, is that not begging the question?

This is also one reason I don’t speak of natural/supernatural. The terms are too vague. I prefer to speak of material and immaterial or extramaterial.

He also says he has a similar problem with God. If the word refers to something that is everything and everywhere, what purpose does the word serve? First off, the word would likely still have some meaning. Second, that’s pantheism, Patrick!

He then goes on to say that if God is something, it should be observable by everyone, examined, and shared by other people. If this is the standard, then several immaterial realities cannot be real. That would include triangularity, goodness, love, numbers, and even existence itself.

“But I see existence every day!”

No. You see things that exist just like you see good things and you see triangles, but you do not see existence, goodness, and triangularity.

Not too long after this, Graffin says the naturalist worldview says that everything is capable of being observed, experimented on, and understanding. Again then, none of those things I mentioned can exist on naturalism. That is the problem with it.

If there is no destiny, there is no design. There’s only life and death. My goal is to learn about life by living it, not by trying to figure out a cryptic plan that the Creator had in store for me.

Graffin, Greg; Olson, Steve. Anarchy Evolution: Faith, Science, and Bad Religion in a World Without God (p. 214). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

This is a problem science has got under naturalism where it denies final causality in denying ultimate purpose. Get rid of final causality and science can’t exist. There has to be regular connection between A and B. I do agree that there is no cryptic will of God for our lives that we are to discover, which will be the subject of soon-to-come blogs.

Standing among those remnant populations, it is impossible not to conclude that we are somehow a part of all this. Some would call this a “spiritual connection”—the sense of being part of some larger web of life. Whatever you want to call it, the feeling is inescapable that we are living among the leftovers of a recent mass extinction. This realization is as emotionally moving to me as, I’m sure, the realization of God’s will was to my great-grandpa Zerr.

Graffin, Greg; Olson, Steve. Anarchy Evolution: Faith, Science, and Bad Religion in a World Without God (p. 232). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

I find it fascinating that Graffin so often makes these statements in this book. He says earlier there is no destiny but just life and death, and then says this. It’s like he’s almost there but refuses to take that final look to see if there is something more. It’s tragic really.

In the last chapter, we’ll see what Graffin says about the after-death.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

Book Plunge: Anarchy Evolution Chapter 7

Is there a place for faith? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Once again, it’s a relief to read Graffin in comparison to other atheists. Graffin does not speak down on faith entirely. There is a problem that he never defines it, but at least he’s not on a tirade like someone like Richard Dawkins is. He says there is a place for it.

So let’s start with this quote I found directly relevant to me:

Not everyone feels empathy to the same degree. On the one hand, some autistic people appear to be born with a neurological condition that severely limits their ability to appreciate the emotional state of other humans, despite having similar experiences. On the other hand, sociopaths either feel no empathy or have become so adept at suppressing it that they never bother to assume another’s perspective. And all of us can become so tired, frustrated, angry, or bored that we ignore our empathic impulses, even when doing so makes others and ourselves miserable.

Graffin, Greg; Olson, Steve. Anarchy Evolution: Faith, Science, and Bad Religion in a World Without God (p. 184). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

Speaking as one such person on the spectrum, it’s not that I do not care about other peoples’ emotional states. It’s that I cannot tell what those states are. If someone is silent around me when I think they should say something, I wonder if the problem is me or not. This is especially so when it comes to the opposite sex. I know other neurotypical men struggle with this, but I suspect much more with me. Is the girl flirting or is she just talking? If she speaks with me is that interest or not?

That being said, empathy is not a good basis for our relationships since people have different degrees of understanding and just because I can feel X with someone, it doesn’t mean that I am obligated to do anything. Not only this, this is a highly western way of thinking. This is not a Woke thing with saying Western Civilization is bad. Western Civilization is incredible. It’s saying that in Eastern honor-shame cultures, empathy wouldn’t have the same appeal. People would think not based on how the individual feels, but on the attitudes of the group at large.

Graffin goes on to say that Western religions base moral codes on analogizing human nature and then looking at superhuman figures, such as Jesus or for a lot of Catholics and Orthodox people, saints. (Not to say Protestants don’t have saintly role models as well.) I do not know what he means by analogizing human nature, but I contend he would be benefitted by reading a book on Christian ethics to see how we make our decisions.

In a surprising twist, he says that science is based on empathy. He says that it relies on a shared experience of the world. He then turns and says it is also the best basis for human ethics, which again does not work since many cultures actually have quite different experiences of how the world should work. How do we adjudicate between them? We have to point to something beyond them.

Many religious believers mischaracterize naturalists as people without faith, but that is absurd. Everyone must believe in something—it’s part of human nature. I have no problem acknowledging that I have beliefs, though they differ from more traditional kinds of faith. Naturalists must believe, first of all, that the world is understandable and that knowledge of the world can be obtained through observation, experimentation, and verification. Most scientists don’t think much about this point. They simply assume that it is true and get to work. But this assumption has relevance to people other than philosophers. When intelligent design creationists, for example, speak of replacing methodological naturalism in science classes with theistic naturalism, they are threatening to remove this assumption from the shared presuppositions of public discourse.

Graffin, Greg; Olson, Steve. Anarchy Evolution: Faith, Science, and Bad Religion in a World Without God (p. 204). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

This is a surprising statement again, but yet a refreshing one. He is right in that science assumes that the material world exists and we can have knowledge of it. This is something they should consider. I am again unsure what he means by theistic naturalism.

He also says natural selection is not the main driving force of evolution. He says luck is actually a big part of it. He also says we cannot base our lives on the idea of saying “I am more fit than you, so I get to reproduce and you don’t.” The problem is, “Why not?” Graffin may say he doesn’t like that, but the person who thinks they are more fit could just say “Why should I care about what you like? I need to produce progeny!”

He also says we cannot judge people with respect to an arbitrary idea of what should be considered optimal, but from a naturalistic perspective, why not? It can be granted he would not like that. It is not granted that from his perspective, that is automatically wrong. Graffin has to give the reason why the person in power should care.

He then tells us that simply by existing in the human race, we all have a worth and a dignity that is inherent. Okay. Why? If all we are is matter in motion from a cosmic accident that will die in a universe that will cease to be, why should I think any life has inherent value? I agree that all human life has inherent value, but I do not think it can be supported in naturalism.

I don’t believe, for instance, that evolutionary biology or any scientific endeavor has much to say about the value of love. I’m sure a lot can be learned about the importance of hormones and their effects on our feelings. But do the bleak implications of evolution have any impact on the love I feel for my family? Do they make me more likely to break the law or flaunt society’s expectations of me? No. It simply does not follow that human relationships are meaningless just because we live in a godless universe subject to the natural laws of biology. Humans impart meaning and purpose to almost all aspects of life. This sense of meaning and purpose gives us a road map for how to live a good life.

Graffin, Greg; Olson, Steve. Anarchy Evolution: Faith, Science, and Bad Religion in a World Without God (p. 206). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

Why doesn’t it follow though? If Graffin’s worldview cannot explain love, it is a quite weak worldview. Humans can import meaning to loving relationships, but they could also just as easily import it to destructive ones. Who is to say someone would be wrong in doing so in naturalism? What is this good life Graffin speaks of? Again, there is no real in-depth look at the questions.

He lastly speaks of love in relationship to Allison, his now wife. Love requires a trust in that there is no 100% knowledge, though there can be good evidence. He describes love as a unique feeling. I contend love produces feelings, but it is not a feeling. It is an action that one does. Still, Graffin does speak of that trust as a form of faith, which again is refreshing.

Next time, we’ll talk about what it means to believe.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

 

Book Plunge: Anarchy Evolution Chapter 5

What happens when suffering comes?

What role does tragedy play? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

In this chapter, Graffin introduces us to the role that tragedy plays in a life. I found myself moved by reading accounts of people he had lost in his life due to drugs and alcohol. I definitely resonated when he talked about how when you go through a divorce or lose a child to death, it is as if the laws of the universe have been broken. Divorce is easily the greatest tragedy I have gone through. Nothing comes close.

In contrasting to the theistic view, he writes that if there were no death, the world would not be able to contain the biological exuberance. This is certainly true. Yet he goes on from here to say that death requires and receives no justification. It’s simply a part of life.

If this is true, why do we all act like it is not that at all? Are we all just deluded? Why are we all sad? Why do we all try to make sense of death? Why is it that we are scared to see a corpse or to touch a corpse? We can say death is natural in a sense, but natural does not always equal good.

He also says it is hard to be a theist after looking at the fossil record and trying to explain all the death that came before us. No reason is given why this is so. Theism doesn’t require a perfect world at all. Why should it? From a metaphysical standpoint, I find that hard to conceive. Even with Heaven, it is a good world in every sense, but could we not add one more soul and say it is a better world? Only God is perfect in Christian theism.

He also says the central problem of theism is all the suffering in nature, but how can this be the central problem when it is a necessity of Christianity that that problem be there to be dealt with? Christianity has evil right at the center of the world in the cross. Also, if theism has to explain all the evil that comes about in a world made by a good God, can we not ask like Chesterton did that in a world of total chaos, why do we get so much good?

He says also that none of the explanations given for suffering is comforting or satisfactory. The problem is, he doesn’t interact with any of these theodicies. There are plenty of them. Is Graffin throwing all of them out? This is someone who has talked about being skeptical and about the joy of learning, but when it comes to his position, he is not skeptical of if naturalism can explain good and evil and he seems to show no interest in learning about theodicies from theism.

I do agree with him when he speaks out against at funerals saying that God thought it was that person’s time to go. We don’t know that. I always get cautious when I hear someone claim what God is or isn’t doing. How do they know? Do they have access to the divine throne room?

In the end, Graffin unfortunately does not really engage. I wish he had said more. We both agree that there is a lot of tragedy in this life, but Graffin doesn’t give me any hope or meaning to it. At least my worldview can do that.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth) Continue reading Book Plunge: Anarchy Evolution Chapter 5

Book Plunge: Anarchy Evolution Chapter 4

Is atheism an idol? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Once again, this is a refreshing chapter title to read as Graffin writes about The False Idol of Atheism. Would that more atheists would write this way. I have said before that the best service someone like Dawkins could do is to write about just science and not touch at all on subjects he has not studied. When he does so, he loses in those areas, but those who are skeptical of the science and know the other areas well will not take him seriously in the science.

In this chapter, Graffin talks a lot about his love of music, but says something tragic. He says that in listening to his mother’s album of Jesus Christ Superstar, he learned a lot about music, but he also learned about the basic outline of the New Testament. He considered it a bonus that he didn’t have to read about the New Testament to learn about the life of Jesus. What would he say to someone who said “I watched a movie on the life of Darwin! What a bonus! I didn’t have to read books on Darwin to learn about him!”?

This is not to say one cannot learn from such sources, but it is to say the best sources are normally books and one who wants to be informed should be reading them. I have produced materials like podcasts and YouTube videos, but I encourage people to go to the books. Learn from the main sources.

He says later that many people who come to naturalism start from a religious worldview and just ask questions and do not get answers. Sadly, this is true. Even more sad, many churches treat the questions as if they are a problem instead of embracing them. There are pastors out there who will have the judgment of souls on their hands for not tending to their flocks properly, a statement that should frighten every pastor out there. It should. That is a serious responsibility and you’d better be able to base your position in the pulpit on something serious.

He also says some people want to hold on to religion and run from scientific claims. Sadly, this is also true. If you insulate your worldview from reality, what good is it? Christianity must be capable of explaining everything just as any other worldview.

He then says he doesn’t understand the idea of spiritual, but not religious, to which I also agree. We live in an age where there is a spiritual vacuum. Naturalism just doesn’t cover it.

I am also pleased to read how he says that he doesn’t talk about Darwin’s reasons for rejecting theism when he teaches undergrad. What is more important in Darwin is what he thought. Even if one does not believe in evolution, this should be accepted. We need to understand what Darwin thought first.

Graffin then goes on to quote some song lyrics he has to a song and then talks about them in a statement I found quite inspiring.

In my opinion, the worst line in this song is the one where I made a bold claim about religion (“religion’s just synthetic frippery”). The rest of the song conjures up images that apply to everyone, regardless of whether they believe in God. And the most compelling lines of the song, in my opinion, are the questions. This song has been a perennial favorite among Bad Religion fans—believers and nonbelievers alike—and part of the reason for the song’s success, I think, is that its questions are ones that listeners ask themselves.

Graffin, Greg; Olson, Steve. Anarchy Evolution: Faith, Science, and Bad Religion in a World Without God (p. 113). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

I appreciate someone who says they made a bold statement about religion and regrets it. He does acknowledge his band has Christian fans. Generally, it’s not a good idea to alienate your support base and I think a lot of atheists would revel in singing a song that blasted religion. Graffin is a step up from them.

He also talks about non-believers who seem to loathe God and form groups of their own which he says come off like the groups they tend to vilify. Indeed. In a way, internet atheism is a cult of its own. You have to buy into every argument and you can’t give an inch to your opponents on anything.

He says religious believers do not want to debate the big questions in life, but then says many atheists are the same way. I contend many religious people do not want to debate the big questions, but we should. We need to face the big questions head on because we believe Jesus answers the big questions. This is why I encourage atheists to read books that disagree with them, and sadly, they do not.

Yet after saying this, he ends the chapter saying it’s time to cast aside the endless debate on God’s existence. Not at all. If we want to talk about the ultimate questions, this is the biggest one. This is the one that shapes everything else. We must face it head-on.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)