Debate: Does God Exist? # 7

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00:00

Reverend Matt, if that is true as you say, then how do you know that Zeus doesn't exist?

00:07

How do you know that the whole pantheon of Egyptian gods don't exist? How do you know that the two unicorns at Camp Quest don't exist?

00:15

I mean, if the rules of logic exist, maybe it exists because of the two invisible unicorns.

00:21

Can you prove that's not the case? You even say in your Camp Quest that you don't need to prove a negative to prove that they don't exist.

00:29

I'm not here to prove someone does not exist. I'm here to demonstrate that someone does exist and by using the evidence of logic and rationality itself.

00:37

That's what I've been doing. I do not need to prove someone else does not exist because if I can demonstrate that a transcendent absolute mind exists using the concepts of logic, then

00:48

I've demonstrated that there is a transcendent concept, a transcendent absolute mind.

00:53

By definition, if we have a transcendent and absolute mind, we could not have a competing transcendent and absolute mind.

01:01

Therefore, there could not be more than one transcendent absolute mind. Therefore, all the other ones would not be logically possible to have existed or exist.

01:10

Make sense? Make sense to me? No. I'll not respond.

01:18

I'll just go on to my next question. I believe the next question comes from Reverend Slick back to Edwards.

01:25

Oh, that's okay. Okay. My question? Yes. All right. Okay, Edwin.

01:31

Yes. How are you doing? I'm well, thank you. We're all as God made us and many much worse, okay?

01:38

Yes, he did make us. Yeah, you too. Is a transcendent absolute

01:46

God that I've described logically possible? I don't have any idea. The atheistic world view can't answer it?

01:56

I don't know whether it's logically possible or not. We can put up all kinds of,

02:02

I can make a perfectly valid logical syllogism that all women are named

02:08

Matt, that this one person is a woman, therefore this is a Matt. That is a logically consistent argument.

02:16

It doesn't mean that it's true. Now, you still have not informed us how do you know that Zeus is not the true

02:26

God. You have not informed us how do you know that the invisible unicorns are, well, let's turn it around.

02:34

You like it this way? Is it possible the invisible unicorns are true because the rules of logic exist?

02:41

It doesn't make any sense, Matt, because, can you say because the multiplication table exists that maybe

02:48

Osiris and Odin exist? It is not rational.

02:55

Saying it's not rational does not mean it's not rational. Give me a logical reason. I've not done that.

03:00

I have tried, folks, to use logic left and right, upside down, backwards and forwards to demonstrate, yes, there is rationality in the

03:07

Christian worldview, and that we can demonstrate God's existence by using that logic and using that rationality.

03:12

I have yet to hear a cogent, logical response to refute the argument that I have thus delivered.

03:19

If it's not forthcoming, what are you going to conclude about the debate? I've not heard any competent response.

03:27

No disrespect, Matt, Edwin, seriously, but I do not believe that you understand the issue sufficiently. I do not believe you understand the issues of logic and how it relates and comports to reality.

03:36

The Christian worldview allows that. Again, I sincerely mean no disrespect. It's just that your worldview does not allow it to work.

03:44

I was debating a guy in Chicago. It was with Opus Dei. That means the work of God. And he said the only reason

03:50

Mr. Kagan doesn't understand is either, one, he has not catetized properly, or, two, the devil has so taken hold of his heart that he's incapable of understanding.

03:59

Well, no, Mr. Opus Dei and no, Mr. Bennett, it might be that your argument is too ridiculous to really give serious thought to.

04:07

If you are right, then all people at all times and all languages and all religions who use logic would agree with you.

04:16

And that is simply not the case. How do you know that Zeus is not the true God? How do you know the

04:22

Flying Spaghetti Monster doesn't exist? That the apostropharians are right because of the rules of logic?

04:28

The fact that there are rules of logic doesn't prove anything. It proves there are rules of logic that some people say are valid.

04:35

And that's all it proves. So get off your high horse and quit trying to claim that that proves there's some kind of almighty deity.

04:42

Now, I have a question back for you sometime. Matt, I think in the interest of fairness, you had two, he had one.

04:50

We'll give him an additional question. Oh, do I have a question for him? Yes. Yes, I do. Okay, I'm sure you would. Matt, do you have any proof you care to offer these good people on the proposition that God exists other than the fact that you are aware there are certain rules of logic that you can find in philosophy textbooks and in universities?

05:10

Do you have any proof whatsoever you've denied the authority of the Bible? You say you don't think the Bible is necessarily good authority, or at least you're not arguing that the

05:19

Bible is authority. You're not saying that's the case. And various other things, you're not saying it's true because of anything other than what you've come up with somewhere other than the laws of logic exist.

05:33

Do you have any other proofs whatsoever that there is a

05:38

God? Big G, God Almighty, where is your evidence?

05:45

Where is it? I'm glad you called it proofs because that's what I've offered and that's what you called it.

05:51

Thank you very much. I don't have to use TAG, the Transcendental Argument for God's Existence, to demonstrate his existence.

05:57

We can use the Cosmological Argument. I cannot have an infinite regression of uncaused causes. The Kalam Cosmological Argument is very good in this.

06:05

You cannot transverse an infinite number of regressions and get back to a finite beginning source.

06:12

In order to do that, you'd have to transverse from then to now an infinite amount of time. That's impossible to do by the definition of what infinity is.

06:19

Therefore, you cannot have, logically, an infinite regression of causes. There has to be a single uncaused cause.

06:25

Who or what is that cause would then become the issue. I don't have to use TAG, but it's the most logical one because it's the basis of what we used to have a debate with to begin with.

06:36

That's what I will use. It is the most powerful argument I've ever heard for the existence of God and I've repeatedly seen atheists fold under it.

06:44

I'm not trying to boast. Please understand, I'm not trying to do that. I'm just saying that in the experience that I have, in the years that I've been doing this and I'm passionate about this, and I've debated many, many atheists on this,

06:53

I've not seen them refute it. Now, that doesn't mean that it can't be refuted. And I acknowledge that.

06:59

I haven't yet heard that. It doesn't mean it doesn't exist, but I'm waiting for it. And the day that I do hear a good refutation of it,

07:05

I will stop using that argument. But that does not mean God does not exist and it doesn't mean I can't demonstrate his existence using other means.

07:12

It's cosmological. And then there's historical evidences and things like this. And by the way, I do not deny the authority of the

07:19

Word of God, the Bible. Well, I'm certainly glad to hear that. Then I suppose if the

07:25

Bible says that God creates evil, you believe that as well. Which it does, if you want to know the quote.

07:33

Pardon? Isaiah 4571, debated on the beta. No, number's 45. Isaiah 4571.

07:39

Okay. Now, you don't know. Let me see, you want that quote exactly?

07:45

I'm sure you do. Oh my goodness, I just switched. You're right, it's Isaiah 457.

07:51

I form the light and create darkness. I make peace and create evil. I, the

07:56

Lord, do all these things. Thank you. Now, I hope, Matt, you're not going to go back and put on your radio show that another atheist went down to your brilliant dialectic, to your argument that you seem to feel is so splendid.

08:12

And you have other arguments, such as an uncaused cause, that there must be something at the end of that whole chain that caused all of that.

08:22

Why must there be? And if there must be, then what caused that?

08:28

And what makes you think those are the only two options that exist? What incredible arrogance to think it has to be either this way or that way, my way or the highway.

08:39

Those may not be the only two options. There may be options we have not yet thought of.

08:45

And if we close our mind with a blanket of religious dogma and belief, we'll never get to that and never know.

08:52

Don't do that to ourselves. We have our audience questions that will be forthcoming.

09:10

Again, just a reminder, please try to keep those questions succinct and brief. Address them to the particular individual.

09:15

And then we may allow some counter -response and dialogue between the two if time will permit that.

09:21

Okay, first up. My question is for Reverend Slick. The fact that some atheists cannot give a valid explanation for the origin of logic is not itself evidence that there was some

09:36

God who produced logic. So what is your evidence to support your hypothesis?

09:42

I've already given the evidence. And saying that it's not evidence does not make it so. If you're going to posit that logic is valid for you to make that statement, then it's up to you to demonstrate that your statement is valid.

09:51

You've made a statement. You've said it's not sufficient or it doesn't prove it. Why doesn't it?

09:57

Just saying it doesn't make it so. So what you've done is actually committed a logical fallacy in trying to ask a difficult question, which isn't a difficult question.

10:04

To rephrase what he's saying is I done told you if you don't like the answer, go home.

10:10

Okay, that's what he just said. This is also for Reverend Slick. I would like to pose a question that's a hypothesis of how logic could have came into existence without any supernatural force at all.

10:23

And just to see how you react to it. Is it possible that logic came into existence as less evolved creatures billions of years ago and adapted to their environments, developed the neural networks that were capable of extracting probabilistic laws from the physical world from the things they experienced, and out of those probabilistic laws created these abstractions which we call logic, and that those organisms that did develop these computational abilities were more likely to survive and reproduce than those who did not, and therefore logic evolved?