Atheist Debate Breakdown | Collision w/ Jeff Durbin

What's up, everybody, I'm Pastor Jeff Durbin. This is another episode of Collision. Today, we're talking about a public debate with atheists on ethics at the

University of Utah. Here we go. All right, so Dr.

James White and I have had the opportunity to do a couple debates together now at the

University of Utah, and we've gone toe -to -toe with some atheists there on the existence of God and also do ethics depend upon God.

Fairly recently, we were at the University of Utah together doing a team debate against two atheist, agnostic, humanist ethicists, and it's a fancy word for unbelievers that try to talk about morality.

And so we were able to do this debate publicly, moderated public debate. It was a blessing to be a part of it, and I wanted to provide some commentary on this debate, which you can find on YouTube, on our channel.

Just look up Dr. James White, Jeff Durbin, Atheist Debate. You'll find it. It is atheist versus Christian.

Do ethics depend upon God? So the start of the debate was the question of, do ethics depend upon God?

Has to be answered from the Christian perspective that God is the necessary precondition in every way of this question to make sense of it.

Because if we don't have man as the image of God, then what obligation do we have in this question of ethics to not abuse other human beings?

What obligation do we have in this debate to be logically consistent? Am I to hold to logical consistency?

Or even in the debate, why can't I lie through my teeth during this debate, this public moderated debate?

Why can't I lie about evidences? Why can't I just make things up? Am I obligated to tell the truth in the debate?

Am I obligated to respect my opponents? What if I just got up in the middle of the debate because I felt like I was losing and I gave

Jared Anderson and Dr. Dean Chatterjee a beat down, a physical beat down in order to win the debate?

Do you see the point? Apart from the Christian worldview and the revelation of God, you can't make sense of the ethical question in any way.

And so that was the foundation of the debate and that's what we laid down. And what I argued at the very beginning was that the atheists and the agnostics, the humanists that we debate with on this question of ethics or the question of a moral system for everyone to follow, the challenge is that they are gonna be consistently abandoning their worldview, their view of the world, their view of humanity, their view of ethics.

There are no absolutes. There's nothing ultimately meaningful or purposeful. They're gonna abandon their worldview in order to reach over into the

Christian worldview to borrow capital, philosophical capital from us, ethical capital from us in order to make sense of their arguments.

And so I do highly encourage you to go watch the debate. I hope it's a blessing to you guys. But what I argued at the beginning is you need to watch our opponents because they're not neutral and neither are we.

We approach this with presuppositions, commitments ahead of time or a pre -belief system that we're standing on.

And what I argued was in order to argue in the debate, our opponents were gonna have to abandon their worldview they walked in with and they were gonna have to consistently reach over into our worldview to borrow capital to make sense of what they were doing and what they were saying.

And so let's take a look. If I could ask you this question to respond to the quote that I had in my opening statement from Dr.

Will Provine, the professor of biological sciences at Cornell. He says that because of his views of modern evolutionary biology, it tells us loud and clear, and these are

Darwin's views, that there are no gods, no purposeful forces of any kind, no life after death. When I die,

I'm absolutely certain that I'm gonna be all completely dead. That's just all, that's gonna be the end of me. There is no ultimate foundation for ethics, no ultimate meaning in life and no free will for humans either.

Could you respond to Dr. Will? Now, real fast, the reason I started with this is because I wanna keep pointing to the feet of my opponents.

I'd be happy for them to keep pointing at my feet as well. Like Jeff, you are standing on the

Christian worldview that says this, and I have questions about that. That would be wonderful for them to do. But what

I wanted to do was remind the audience and our opponents of the worldview that they're supposed to be holding to.

And so what I do in cases like this is point somebody to Dr. Will Provine, professor of biological sciences at Cornell University.

He's actually dead now. The reason why I love Dr. Will Provine in this respect is that there were so many moments with Dr.

Provine of just brutal honesty with the atheistic system. No meaning, no purpose in life, no life after death, no ultimate meaning in life, no ultimate foundation for ethics.

I wanted to remind the audience and our opponents that their worldview is supposed to consistently say there's no ultimate foundation for ethics.

And so what are you doing coming into a public moderated debate, arguing about ethical systems when your system really believes that there's no ultimate foundation for ethics?

Ethics are just what we make up to cooperate with each other, but they're not really ultimate. They're not absolute.

So that's why I brought the quote. Provine, given your worldview. Yeah, I agree with the beginning of that.

I do personally believe that when we die, our consciousness most likely does not persist.

I would comment on the ultimate versus greater because I think that's very, very important.

It is true that questions of meaning are not objective or absolute.

And that is an amazing, wonderful thing. Because again, that means that each of...

It's amazing and wonderful thing that questions of meaning are not objective.

I hope you don't miss that because that is something that the Christian worldview could never say.

We do believe that meaning is objective. It's outside of ourselves. It's not just a subjective thing where I think this is meaningful over against this thing is meaningful.

In a debate about ethics, that's a very, very serious admission that these aren't objective things out there.

So in other words, the question of meaning and a question of ethics in a debate, you could have a person over here that says,

I don't think that we should rape and pillage and destroy. And a person over here that says, well, I don't find that to be meaningful for life.

I think we should rape and pillage and destroy. Well, if it's just subjective, if it's just between the two people and their own perspectives, well, then nobody's ultimately right because that's not an objective question in the first place.

There's not something outside of people that's the standard by which they are to be measured by.

There's not the character of God. There's not the very word of God. And so when he admits there that these questions about meaning are not objective, he's given up the debate.

The debate is over at that point. And it's not beautiful. It's not beautiful at all.

If it's just a mass of moving tissue throughout the universe of people just making noises out of their mouths because they have brain gas going on, then that's not beautiful at all.

Us is able to determine what is meaningful to us and what is important to us.

Tell that to the Green River Killer. Tell that to Ted Bundy. Tell that to any number of serial killers over the last generation.

It's about what's meaningful to us. Well, if that's true and everyone has their say anyways, then we should open up the jail cells and let everybody out because everybody has their own truth.

Everybody has their own experience of what's meaningful for them. I honor the fact that for many here,

Christ and the Bible are guidelines for meaning and purpose and ethics.

I celebrate that. You need to use the Bible very carefully, but that is not the case for everyone.

But the important thing that makes it greater than us individually to answer some of the questions as far as like, aren't there just billions of points of view?

Well, yes, there are billions of points of view, but again, we are all part of the conversation.

Is Ted Bundy part of the conversation? Is Hitler part of the conversation?

Is Stalin part of the conversation? Mao, Pol Pot, how about the plantation owners in this nation that we've dealt with behind us?

Are they all part of the conversation too? Do they just get to say their say? Because nothing's objective in the first place.

It's all subjective. It's just everyone gets to tell their piece, their side of the story. Nobody really believes that and neither does

Jared Anderson. And so in response, yes, even if there is no life after death, even if there is no absolute meaning, that means that there is life before death and there is meaning before death.

Mr. Anderson, I don't think you answered the question, so I'll ask it again. Please do. He says there's no ultimate foundation for ethics given your worldview.

Yes. No ultimate meaning in life and no free will for humans either. You say that it needs to be meaningful to us.

It's at least meaningful to us. Was it meaningful to the Green River killer, Gary Ridgway?

Was his determination of what was meaningful for him just as valuable or meaningful as your perspective that he was wrong?

Meaningful is different than defensible. I work with murderers and pedophiles all the time.

I have a least favorite pedophile. Are they wrong? He's very annoying. Yes. They're absolutely wrong. They're absolutely wrong.

Or they're technically intersubjectively wrong. So there you go. He caught himself.

He wants to, and there's what I was pointing to, the image of God's just gonna pour out of this guy and be in conflict with what he's saying he believes about the world all throughout the debate.

That's what we said ahead of time. Watch what's coming out of their mouths versus what they're standing on. And so he wants to say that what this man did was absolutely wrong.

This pedophile is absolutely wrong. And then it's like, well, is that what your worldview allows you to say? Oh, wait a second.

No. I'm not supposed to be saying that anything is absolutely wrong. So intersubjectively wrong, whatever that means.

But it's just, it's an incoherent answer. It's a meaningless answer. And he goes on. They're not absolutely wrong.

No, because it's all a conversation. So the debate's over, friends. They are intersubjectively wrong.

So you admit, Mr. Anderson, that they are not absolutely wrong. The Green River Killer is not absolutely wrong.

Ted Bundy is not absolutely wrong. Child rapists are not absolutely wrong. And you came to debate that your worldview provides a foundation for ethics?

Yes, the humanist perspective does provide a foundation for ethics. Because again, rape is wrong.

Murder is wrong. According to the cultural conversation that we are all of which apart.

So if a society draws a circle around themselves and says that you can kill and cannibalize other human beings, as long as they're a large enough society that draws a circle around themselves and they determine that it's right, it's right to eat other humans?

Some cultures have believed that, yes. Is that okay? And so this point here is pushing

Mr. Anderson to the point where he has to actually defend his assertions.

And so from a Christian perspective, if I was to say that rape is absolutely wrong, somebody should have the right to challenge that and say, why do you believe that?

And the Christian has to give a coherent response as to, okay, what are the building blocks underneath the claim of rape is absolutely wrong that can make sense of the claim, rape is absolutely wrong.

Building blocks like every image bearer of God is created uniquely by God. An image bearer of God is to be protected and they are valuable.

God commands us not to take the life of another person in an unjustified manner. God is love.

Love does no harm to its neighbor. And so rape is actually explicitly condemned through the word of God in scripture as actually something that is worthy of capital punishment.

It is such a sin. It is such a crime. It is worthy of capital punishment. So the Christian builds the blocks underneath the claim, it's absolutely wrong.

But when you have this discussion with a humanist or an atheist and they make the claim that rape is wrong, it's right to say, according to who?

Who says that it's wrong? And what's interesting here is that the unbeliever, because they reject

God's revelation, has to go somewhere. And so they only have limited options. They could say, well,

I personally feel that it's wrong. Well, you're not in charge of anybody. And so that's an insignificant moral system.

You personally disagree, you're not in charge of anybody. You're not lording it over anybody. So what unbelievers will typically do, ethicists like this is they will say, well, we gotta go somewhere for this.

So how about we say that it's a conversation we've had as a society where we've determined as a society that this is a no -no.

You can't do A, B or C in this society. Well, the challenge with that is if the cultural conversation and the society at the time is making the rules, then that means that nobody could ever work for reformation within a society because you would be the immoral one arguing against a cultural norm.

For example, if you take what he's saying here and you go back to the time of slavery, well, slavery was accepted in many circles.

It was largely accepted. It was legal to do it. And according to his system, because they had that cultural conversation, it was moral to enslave our black brothers and sisters.

And anybody who argued against it like the abolitionists were the immoral ones because society had already determined that we could do it.

So the point here is if Jared Anderson wants to build a foundation for an ethical system that says we've decided as a society that this is a no -no, then that means that you're arguing that the society could determine that you can kill

Jews and handicap people. And that's right because they've decided and had that conversation and nobody should have any argument with it because they've had that conversation and they've decided.

Do you see the point? They are part of the conversation. Is that ethical? Depends on the context.

So killing and cannibalizing other human beings could be ethical in your system?

If you're frozen after a plane crash and are soccer players, perhaps. No, I think you missed it, Mr. Anderson.

I'll say it again. Killing and cannibalizing another human being could be ethical so long as you have enough people that agree with you.

That's not what would make it ethical. It would not be the agreement. It would be the conversation and the navigation and the negotiation.

So ultimately the agreement. So all these fancy words to say the agreement through the navigation and the conversation and all the rest, we would get to the agreement and then we would decide, like we can murder and dispatch and eat a human being and that's ethical.

We don't have to love our neighbors. We could also eat our neighbors. So for example, a mercy killing would be an example of ethical killing because again, the best version of that person would agree.

In my ethics class in divinity school, I argue that the second best version of serial killers want to be killed.

So that's a common ground that you and I have. So Mr. Anderson, given what you've just said, why ought we to love our neighbors rather than eat them?

Because that is what they prefer and that is part of the cultural conversation. And yes, all of these groups should be part of the conversation and I think we should be horrified by what

Mao and Stalin and Pol Pot have done. But you've already admitted Mr. Anderson that there's no absolute above Mao or Stalin or Pol Pot.

So why should we be, let me finish the question. Yes. Why should we be horrified when there is no absolute standard to hold them to?

You've already agreed that if they decide as a culture and community that what they did was right, morally right, then they're right in your system and there's no complaint.

Because the victims would not agree and the victims also have a say. The victims you believe are descendants of bacteria.

Yep. And there you go. So I hope this is a benefit to all of the believers who are watching this that it's important for us to recognize that Christ is truly the foundation of knowledge.

If you want an epistemologically sound system that is consistent and that is a grounding, you need the word of God.

You need Christ. And I hope it's also a blessing to see that we do not need as Christians and Christians in debate or Christian philosophers, we do not need to abandon our commitment to the word of God as foundational and pretend neutrality to do this.

Because you can see the wheels fall off here. The wheels fall off when you just point to the system they're supposed to be holding to.

Now I grant, I grant that when you have a conversation in public debate with other human beings and you bring up emotionally challenging issues like rape and like murder and those sorts of things, everybody feels the weight of that.

And when Jared Anderson uses a word like victim, everybody feels the weight of that because maybe many of us have been victimized in our lives or we've seen people victimized.

We hate people to be victimized. We know there are perpetrators and victims. We wanna side with the victim because we're in the image of God.

We believe in justice. So Jared Anderson as a humanist ethicist, as a humanist who's trying to make an ethical system, he brings up the issue of a victim and everybody feels the emotional weight of it.

But my argument was is that he's reaching into the Christian worldview to borrow capital like emotional pain for victims.

I get to have emotional pain for victims as a Christian because I have a worldview that makes sense of that person and their dignity and their value and injustice.

But when he uses the word victim, he doesn't have a right to it, which is why I said to him, and you believe that these victims are descendants of bacteria, correct?

And he says, yes. So why should we care about the descendants of bacteria being victimized?

Do you see the point? The unbelieving worldview has no foundation whatsoever. Hey, what's up guys? This is

Pastor Jeff Durbin. Thank you for watching Collision. We wanted to provide a solid resource to help you to respond to anything coming into Collision with the

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