Evidence VS. Proof

[simplejeff]

Hebrews 3:12,18,19
Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God…

Hebrews 4:2,6
For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it…

Numbers 14:11
And the LORD said unto Moses, How long will this people provoke me? and how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I have shewed among them?

[Walk Softly]

51 minutes ago, Vince said:

Your appealing to ignorance. You claim to have proof then say Christianity is true because you don’t know of any other worldview/religion that holds up to your “proof”.  You haven’t proven Christianity true in the first place.

Then you appeal to the bible which you have no proof is reliable.  Why should I believe god exists because of nature? What specific qualities should I know because of what I see in nature?

I've made a claim and you are unable to argue against it.  If you could you would.  

You attempted to appeal to experience and it didn't hold.  This is what happens when you don't have a foundation upon which your presuppositional assumptions rest.  You know this and now here we are.  I've seen this many times before... I know what comes next. 

In an attempt to avoid that, let me make my claim again so it's loud and clear and there is no question to what I am saying here.  

When you argue against the ultimate authority of the Bible, on any level, you undermine the preconditions of intelligibility and destroy logic, uniformity in nature and absolute morality. 

In that, we must internally critique the opposing worldview and therein you will find the proof of God as it rests in the impossibility of the contrary.

The Bible absolutely tells us to refute blatant contradictions.  Like the unbelievers who live in contradiction to their worldview by assuming you can predict the future by appealing to experience. 

holding fast the faithful word as he has been taught, that he may be able, by sound doctrine, both to exhort and convict those who contradict.
Titus 1:9

The Bible makes it clear we are either for Him or against Him.  If you are against Him, you will be refuted and exposed. 

1 hour ago, Vince said:

Is your proof found in scripture? 

Of course.  The Bible alone accounts for the preconditions of intelligibility.  Laws of logic, uniformity in nature and absolute morality.  

To refute this, another worldview would need to be able to do this.  

Fear of the Lord is the foundation of true knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.
Proverbs 1:7 

Without God, you could know nothing. 

[simplejeff]

1 Chronicles 28:9And thou, Solomon my son, know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind: for the LORD searcheth all hearts, and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts: if thou seek him, he will be found of thee;

but if thou forsake him, he will cast thee off for ever.

===============================================

Hebrews 3:12,18,19
Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God…

Hebrews 4:2,6
For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it…

Numbers 14:11
And the LORD said unto Moses, How long will this people provoke me? and how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I have shewed among them?

[simplejeff]

32 minutes ago, Vince said:

Then why does Walk Softly have proof god exists? Why is he trying to prove he exists. With proof there is no faith and no pleasing god right?

Rather what is the reality of your purpose (or what you think it is),

for whoever rejects the Word of Yahweh, or whoever rejects Jesus, or whoever rejects His messengers,  has also rejected Yahweh.

 

 

[Walk Softly]

10 hours ago, Vince said:

Where?

Here are a couple of each.  This is by no means an exhaustive list. 

Laws of logic
Numbers 23:19 
Colossians 2:3
John 14:6 
2 Timothy 2:13

Uniformity in nature
Genesis 8:22 
Malachi 3:6 

Absolute morality 
Matthew 5:48 
Luke 18:19 

10 hours ago, Vince said:

do you have an answer for hard solipsism?

 

Of course I do.  This isn't my first rodeo, Vince. 

I hope you can hang with me on this one.  Unlike your desire to continue asserting that unbelievers have a foundation for assuming past experience can predict the future.  For the last time, it's called the inductive principle as posited by Hume.  No one has been able to sufficiently explain WHY you can or even should appeal to past experiences to assume the future, except Christians.  If you somehow think you've accomplished this, you will literally be famous.  No kidding. 

I've broken the internal critique of Solipsism into 2 sections.  

Part 1.  Solipsism - Exposing the unfounded knowledge claim

First we need to understand that the issue of whether knowledge is possible is intimately linked to the issue of how knowledge is possible. In the Christian worldview, knowledge is revealed by God through various means.  To the "how", knowledge is possible by revelation from an omniscient God.  

Now, the solipsist assumes that only he exists for certain.  But why does he even believe that?  Maybe it is because he has a sensation of "thinking."  He would assume this thinking is his own.  Unfortunately, this begs the question, because in supposing that he is the one doing the thinking the Solipsist has already pressuposed his existence, which is the very thing he is supposed to be proving. He can't really know using his own system that he even exists.  

This is where we hit part 2.  Exposing the skeptic. 

Logically, if the Solipsist can't know he exists, it reduces to skepticism that we can't know anything at all.  If he can't know he exists, what could he know? 

It becomes very easy at this point.  Once the skeptic asserts that we can't know anything, I'm going to ask a very simple question. 

Do you know that? 

Of course, he must answer no since a yes answer would be self-refuting. But when he says, no he has conceded defeat – he admits that his position cannot be rationally defended. He doesn’t really know anything by his worldview. In so doing he has abdicated his seat at the epistemological debate.  There is no point in listening to someone who, by his own admission, knows nothing. 

Again, apart from Christianity, we could know nothing at all. Proverbs 1:7.

Edited February 19, 2019 by Walk Softly

[Walk Softly]

10 hours ago, Vince said:

Then why does Walk Softly have proof god exists? Why is he trying to prove he exists. With proof there is no faith and no pleasing god right?

No amount of proof will make someone believe.  Believing in God is a choice everyone must make.  You either do or you don't. 

What does the Word say about this proof equals belief idea?

 Then the eleven disciples went away into Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them. When they saw Him, they worshiped Him; but some doubted.
Matthew 28:16‭-‬17 

Some, standing in the presence of the resurrected Yeshua, doubted.  

I wasn't even going to address this, but I grew increasingly concerned about the doubt you seem so joyful in promoting.  

Edited February 19, 2019 by Walk Softly

[enoob57]

The place of hell was created for those who have emptied themselves of rational.... endless loops of nothingness!

[TomatoHorse]

@Walk Softly

Hello again! You seem to be an intelligent, well-read and thoughtful individual who I would like to interact more with   I've been gone for a few days and this thread has moved along quite a ways so I'm not sure if I should continue discussing things with you here, or a different thread, or PMs?  Let me know what you'd prefer. In the meantime, I'd like to respond to some of your points in this thread regarding how you as a Christian have an absolute certain source of knowledge and truth that naturalists do not have. 

You have well thought-out critiques describing potential sources of error in the way we perceive and understand the physical world. But I don’t think that you can escape from them yourself! You claim to have a special avenue of knowledge that lets you rise above the naturalistic ways of knowing the world which you critique. But how do you get this knowledge and truth?
 

Would you say you get it from the Bible? That comes to you through your eyes as you read it, and through your brain as you interpret the meaning of the words. You can’t escape the uncertainty of your brain and your physical senses there.
 

Would you say that you have a mystical, “straight from God” internal source of truth (which I shall refer to as “SGIST” to keep it short ), then I would question these things about it:

1. The source. Your SGIST could be your own feelings. Or it could be another divine / spiritual entity deceiving you. Or perhaps some psychological phenomenon where you experience thoughts or messages as coming from an “other,” even though they originate in one’s own brain. It could be any number of sources other than the Christian God.

2. The accuracy. How do you know that you are receiving and/or interpreting these messages exactly, 100% correctly in your SGIST? In all other forms of communication that we know of there is always a layer (or two, or three...) of a receiving mechanism and/or interpretation where things can go wrong. What evidence do we have that your SGIST is any different?
    

Would you say that you read the Bible, and that God’s Spirit bear witness inside you of the truth you read? That’s really just a combination of the Bible and SGIST, and subject to all of their respective uncertainties.

I even suspect that your own critique of solipsism works against you, for similar reasons as I pointed out above regarding the Bible and SGIST. In summary, it seems that the very criticisms you raise against naturalism cut against you like a two-edged sword.

I imagine you've thought about these things, and I look forward to hearing your response. Also, I would like to continue interacting with you about logic, morality, etc. But please let me know how you would prefer to do so

Edited February 19, 2019 by TomatoHorse

[enoob57]

48 minutes ago, Vince said:

That is not what the Bible says.  Jesus said hell was created for the devil and his angels (Mt 25:41).  But he has no problem sending people there who are unbelievers.

you have a unique way of defining those and themselves as to a specific being.... I would say that is going beyond the text of what I wrote. Many perform this kind of error in textual interpretation.... by not defining the specific being I covered all in hell! 

[Walk Softly]

1 hour ago, Vince said:

People can read what you said and what I said and make up their own minds.  They can also find and study these ideas on their own.  

Yes they certainly can, Vince.  If they are astute they will see that you haven't addressed the problem, only confirmed it. 

The problem is not the description of the immaterial, universal, invariant, abstract entities which govern all possible conceptual relationships...known as the laws of logic. 

The problem is WHY they exist in the first place.  The unbeliever, while they can describe them as you pointed out, cannot ACCOUNT for their existence or their justification for assuming them to be true.  

Christians can account for them .  

I don't need a description of them, anyone can provide that.  I want to know WHY they are there, and how the unbeliever can account for them.  But you know this. ?

How did that which is particular and contingent give rise to that which is universal and necessary?