Debate: Does God Exist? # 1

CARM

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:10

We are going to try, and I say try, to observe rules of the quorum here this evening. I would ask that you refrain from giving applause until we reach the break, and then at the break after the conclusions, you are more than welcome to give a hearty round of applause for both of our debaters tonight.

00:24

This will be a civil and hopefully profitable debate for all of you that are here this evening. Our debate format will be as follows.

00:31

We will have 15 -minute opening statements. We will begin with Reverend Slick, and then we will have a 15 -minute opening statement by Edwin Kagan.

00:40

We will then follow up conversely with 10 -minute responses, and then follow that with 5 -minute conclusions.

00:47

After that, we will take a 10 -minute break, and then we will come back and we will have three series of alternating questions, beginning with Matt, or beginning with Edwin, and going to Reverend Slick.

00:59

They will have two minutes to respond, and then one minute to give a follow -up response to that question.

01:04

Following the alternating questions, we will open up the floor to the audience for questions, and we would ask that your questions be pertinent, to the point, and addressed to one of the debaters.

01:14

Please, no sermonizing, soliloquizing, all of those different things tonight. Make it brief and to the point.

01:20

So without further ado, we'll begin tonight with Reverend Matt Slick's opening here for the first 15 minutes.

01:27

Reverend Slick. Thank you. I just want to clarify, my last name really is

01:33

Slick. I did not change it. I was born with that name. And I learned to run as a kid because of it, and I have a black belt in run -foo because of that.

01:42

Now, look, what I'm going to do is read this tonight. I normally am just extemporaneous, so I'm going to have to read a little bit quickly to get it all in, so I hope you will bear with me, all right?

01:50

Thank you. Now, I want to thank all of you for coming here, and I want to thank you, Mr. Kagan, for showing up as well.

01:57

Edwin, thank you. You can call me Matt. In order for this debate to occur,

02:04

Mr. Kagan and I, Edwin, we had to have prior agreements on a topic, a location, duration, format, and so forth, but we've also agreed, though not formally, that this debate should be logical.

02:17

In fact, without logic, we don't have a debate. Now, I have a question for you, Edwin. How do you as an atheist account for the existence of logic?

02:26

Remember, the question is directed to you as an atheist. How do you account for the existence of logic? The question is important, and it directly relates to God's existence.

02:35

Asking that a person give an account for something based on his worldview is not a kindergarten exercise. It is not a word game.

02:42

It is an important philosophical question worth answering, especially given the fact that we live in a finite and physical universe, yet use logic, which is a transcendent and conceptual reality.

02:53

So I hope to show that the atheist perspective cannot rationally account for logic, but the

02:58

Christian one can because it acknowledges God's existence. But in order to do this, I have to accomplish two things.

03:04

First, I need to offer a definition of God. So God is that supreme being who exists independent of the universe, who does not change, is absolute, transcends space and time, who is self -aware, who is all -knowing, ever -present, and can accomplish whatever he desires to accomplish.

03:20

In short, I'm proposing the Christian God. The second thing I want to address is a simple logical principle.

03:27

If there are only two possibilities to explain something, and one of the possibilities is incapable of explaining it, then by default, the other is validated.

03:36

Let me illustrate. Let's say there's a man named Frank who has a small room in his house in which he keeps valuables.

03:43

The room is encased in thick metal, has no windows, no vents, and can only be opened by a keypad that requires a sequence of numbers that only

03:51

Frank knows. There's an alarm, a heat detector, and a motion detector. Now, Frank has just acquired a bag full of rare coins.

03:58

He puts them inside the room, on the table, exits, and immediately locks the door behind him. Frank then goes directly to his car, drives to a meeting, and returns three hours later to inventory his currency.

04:08

But to his surprise, after he disarms the alarms, unlocks the door, and enters the room, he finds the coins are not in the bag where he left them.

04:16

Instead, they are neatly stacked on the table. Upon further examination, he discovers that the stacks of coins are in separate piles in sequences of prime numbers from 2 to 31.

04:27

Frank wants to know how it happened. He calls the police. When they arrive, they find no physical evidence that anyone else besides Frank had been in the room.

04:36

For all they know, he arranged the coins. There aren't any fingerprints, shoe prints, or traces of DNA other than Frank's.

04:42

But Frank knows he did not arrange the coins, and the coins didn't arrange themselves. Frank is bewildered and refuses to believe that someone got into the room.

04:50

His criteria for proof necessitates that there be some fingerprints, shoe prints, prime marks, or the alarms having gone off.

04:58

But none of these evidences are there. So he refuses to believe the obvious because his criteria for proof doesn't include the possibility that some intelligent agent arranged the coins logically without also being detected in the manner that he so chooses.

05:12

Now we can see that the proof is there. Obviously, someone arranged the coins. But Frank is not persuaded.

05:18

Why? Because proof is different than persuasion. Okay, now let me reduce this illustration to a simple proposition.

05:26

Either intelligence or non -intelligence arranged the coins. There aren't any other options. In like manner, in this debate, we have only two options.

05:33

There either is a God or there is not a God. Since there are only two options, we can take a look at them and ask a question.

05:40

Which position, the theistic or atheistic, can account for the existence of logic? One of them has to be able to.

05:45

Otherwise, we have no rational reason for the existence of logic at all. Now Mr.

05:51

Kagan might say he doesn't know how to account for logic. I have no problem with him pleading ignorance should he so choose.

05:56

After all, Christians sometimes do the same thing. Or on the other hand, he might say he doesn't need to give account for the existence of logic.

06:03

And he might offer various reasons why he doesn't need to. In either case, whether it is ignorance or ignoring, I'll continue through with this debate using my argument and enjoy

06:11

Mr. Kagan's neglect in responding to it. But I do expect a logical response from him, and I hope it is forthcoming.

06:19

So in anticipation of possible responses from my atheist opponent, I want to enlist the help of previous atheists who've tried to give me an account for the existence of logic.

06:29

I will enlist their aid, their arguments, and attempt to show why they are invalid, but I won't stop there.

06:36

After I've shown that their arguments are invalid, I'll try to show that the Christian perspective can account for logic and thereby demonstrate that God exists.

06:45

So what is logic? Logic is the process of proper thinking based upon principles that govern the validity of arguments.

06:52

Logic is used in proofs, reputations, explanations, and even in debates. Logic has laws.

06:58

I'll list three of them. The first law of logic is the law of identity. Something is what it is and is not what it is not.

07:04

For an example, an egg is an egg and not a flashlight. The second law of logic is the law of non -contradiction.

07:10

This means that something cannot be true and false at the same time in the same way.

07:16

In other words, two contradictory statements cannot both be true. The third law of logic is the law of excluded middle, which states that a statement is either true or false.

07:25

We are here is a true statement. The planet Mars is in my pocket is not a true statement. Now these laws and others are logical absolutes and they form the basis of rational discourse.

07:35

So let me reiterate my argument in brief before I tackle the atheist attempt to account for logic.

07:42

I propose that logical absolutes are conceptual realities that do not depend upon human minds or the physical universe for their existence.

07:50

Since they're conceptual, absolute, and transcend space and time, there must be an absolute and transcendent mind from which these logical absolutes are derived.

07:59

I conclude that absolute and transcendent mind is God. That is my explanation. But before I try and support it, let's take a look at the atheist explanations.

08:08

First, atheists tell me that logic is the product of a single human person who thought it up and other people agreed that it was true.

08:18

The problem here is that if you assume that one person thought it up, then what happens when another person says it's false?

08:25

If logic's existence and truth is based upon an individual's thinking it is true, then another person can say it is false and it would be false.

08:32

But this is illogical since something is not false because someone says it's false. The second explanation

08:38

I've heard is that logical absolutes are conventions. In other words, their principles that we humans agree are valid, but agreeing that they are valid doesn't account for them.

08:47

This would also mean that logical absolutes are then subject to vote and popular agreement. But this would mean that something is true because a lot of people believe it to be true.

08:56

What would happen if the majority of people started saying that truth is not absolute or that mutually contradictory statements are valid?

09:02

Would it mean then that these things would be so? Of course not. So that argument doesn't work. The third explanation

09:08

I've heard is that logic and logical absolutes are the result of chemical processes in the brain. The problem here is that if someone's brain chemistry is altered, then logic is altered.

09:18

But that can't work. Besides, people's brains are different and often contradict each other. So people's brains can't be the sorts of logical absolutes which transcend their minds, in spite of their particular brain chemistry.

09:30

The fourth explanation is to say that logic is a function of language. If that is so, then is logic in Spanish better than logic in English?

09:39

Or is Russian logic superior to French logic? If they differ due to language constructs and patterns, then is there a

09:45

Spanish logic, an English logic, and a French logic? That would make no sense. Seeing this difficulty, atheists sometimes say that language constructs are consistent across different languages, in spite of the stylistic diversity, and that they reveal logic.

09:59

But that is exactly it, they reveal logic. It is already there. Linguistic constructs don't invent logic or form it.

10:07

Linguistic constructs describe logical processes. The fifth explanation is that logic is a property of the universe, like the natural physical laws of motion and gravity.

10:16

The problem here is that it equates logic with things like weight, mass, heat, and cold, all of which can be measured and their effects observed.

10:23

But how do you measure and observe the effects of the law of non -contradiction or the law of excluded middle? If you could develop an experiment to test for logic, like you would motion or gravity, you'd have to use logic beforehand to develop the test.

10:36

And this would assume the validity of the very logic you're trying to test. So this explanation fails. The sixth explanation

10:43

I've heard is similar to the first one here, or the fifth one, that logical absolutes would cease to apply to anything if the physical universe stopped existing, because logical absolutes could no longer be called true or false.