Faith arguments Part 14

44:02 Lennox: So we're back to the question. (D agrees - We need the evidence.) We need the evidence. We do have evidence: in science, part of God's revelation, and this building was probably dedicated to the glory of God. (D disagrees - No, it wasn't actually. Rather the reverse.) Oxford University - the Lord is my light and my illumination. There was the wholeness of life. By putting everything into the science basket, D is not taking history seriously. What is the basis for that? D regards Jesus and what he's done as petty. There's an enormous contrast between standing tall in a silent and cold universe, with no hope, believing that your moral sense must ultimately be an illusion, crying for justice, because most people will never get it, because death ends everything... The contrast between that and enjoying the personal friendship of God and knowing that ultimate justice will be done is immense. (D agrees - Of course, it is.) The basic question is 'is it true or not?' (D agrees - It is completely irrelevant whether it's comforting, if it gives you hope, if it gives you happiness. That has nothing to do with whether it is true or not.) L agrees with that entirely. (D: So we need to know whether it's true.) L agrees.

So, it doesn't matter whether money gives you prosperity, if it keeps the economy going, if it makes markets work, right? That is completely irrelevant, we need to know whether money is true or not. Do we really? If this 'need for truth' idea manifestly doesn't work with money, why do we think it works with God? God as a functional entity is at least as important as an unanswered structural question. We won't be able to answer the structural question till the end of time. The question we can answer right away is 'does the Christian God-concept have an essential role in making modern societies work?' If your answer is no and you consistently give up all that only follows from faith in the Christian God (such as purpose, meaning, justice, truth, reason, pride, 'it is nobler', 'it is petty', etc. and also their opposites like 'no purpose', 'no meaning', etc.), okay. Then own up to the implications of that, and don't take part in any debate on whatsoever. By taking part, you implicitly admit to sharing the 'illusion' that things in the world can make sense, that they can have a purpose, a meaning, that it is important to find out what is 'true' and what is not, that rational enquiry feels and seems useful. These things only matter in a world with God.

45:52 - 47:01 Dawkins: Concerning history, he takes it back that Jesus never existed. Jesus existed. However, if L were to add that Jesus was born of a virgin, that Jesus walked on water, and he turned water into wine, that is palpably anti-scientific. There is no evidence for that. No scientist would take the idea seriously. (L disagrees - He can make it worse for D. Jesus actually claimed to the the logos that created the universe. If this is the Creator incarnate, then making water into wine and so on is really a triviality. The more fundamental thing is that he claimed to be, and gave evidence that he was, God. When D says it's anti-scientific, L doesn't think so at all. Science cannot say that miracles do not occur. It can say they're highly improbable.)

It is fundamental to understand what natural science can and cannot deal with: natural science can deal with visible and palpable (or thereto convertible) bits of reality whose behaviour is observable, measurable, regular and reproducible; natural science cannot deal with anything that is devoid of the aforementioned characteristics, most notably, it cannot deal with anything that behaves according to its own will. Such things fall outside science. Natural science can neither prove them nor disprove them. They are not unscientific or anti-scientific, they are simply out-of-scope. Since God is defined as a sovereign entity with a will of His own, God is not natural science material by definition. Obviously, miracles are out-of-scope, too, as they are not regular or reproducible.