on this subject (that entry has just run out of space, but I was going to draw the discussion to a close anyway).
Mr. Roebuck writes:
1) Mark K. asserts that Western Civilization has crossed a line, and is now officially committed to a war against God. That being so, what good can rational discourse do?
I acknowledge that the system is against us. But rational discourse is our only weapon, and we must not underestimate it. All men are ultimately controlled by what they believe to be true, and the atheists who pride themselves on being rational are vulnerable to a really rational argument.
Furthermore, most people don’t have the intense hatred of God that characterizes Dawkins and his ilk. Normal people can respond to a good argument for God’s existence, especially since few of them have ever heard one.
And hatred of God comes in two types: hatred of the very idea that there might be a God, and hatred of submitting to Him. The leaders of atheism have both kinds, but normal people mostly have the second kind. Being normal people, they can often be reached by arguments for God’s existence.
2) Julien questions my assertion that we can test the philosophical system that forms the basis of our thinking by checking it for consistency, and then using our intuitions. He says:
But while some experiences or “intuitions” seem to reveal order and meaning in the world, others seem to reveal chaos and meaninglessness. How do we know which to pay attention to?
Intuitions, of course, are not sufficient. Like emotions, intuitions are valid, but they can mislead, so they must be interpreted (and tested) by applying an explicitly articulated worldview. The real question is, which worldview is the most consistent, and best accounts for all we observe, including intuition? Here’s an example of the inconsistency of the naturalistic worldview.
Fully-consistent naturalism says that all knowledge must originate with sense perception. But sense perception cannot validate this view. So naturalism contradicts (i.e. destroys) itself.
Actually, most atheists tacit acknowledge this. In my experience, most atheists will eventually say “A supernatural realm may exist, but we are justified in ignoring it unless we see scientific (i.e., sense-based) evidence for it.” They cannot be fully-consistent naturalists.
But of course, they are now saying “the invisible man may exist, but I won’t believe it unless I see him.” They still contradict themselves. (“The supernatural may exist. We can assume the supernatural does not exist.”)
Theism does not contradict itself, as naturalism does. It certainly has its difficulties, but a difficulty is not a contradiction. For example, we find the problem of evil to be distressing, but it involves no actual contradiction.
3) James M. acknowledges that a non-theistic worldview cannot objectively validate morality (and, by implication, public policy). But he seems to be sticking to his position that public policy must be secular. Or at least non-dogmatic.
But let’s be clear: there must be a ruling worldview, and this worldview must enforce its primacy, or else it won’t be the ruling worldview. At least a theistic worldview as the basis of social policy will be philosophically consistent, and will provide answers that at least claim to be objective. After all, if the God of the Bible really exists, then he really has given us objective morality, which we can know (at least in general) by consulting Scripture.
But if atheism or agnosticism is the ruling worldview, then we will be philosophically inconsistent, and we will be unable to claim that our moral principles are objective and timeless. How then could the public order have the respect of the public?
You may think that theistic morality is impractical, but it sure beats the alternative. America and Western Europe are as morally decent as they are only because of the residue of Christian thinking. If that residue fades, atheism may very well turn savage.