Keith Parsons's Blog, page 21

LINKS: Dishonesty and Possible Craig-Lowder Debate

I just posted the following on my personal blog.



"How to Argue that Someone Lied"



"Craig-Lowder Debate?"

(ex-apologist) A Euthyphro to Craig's Argument Against Atheist Significance, Meaning, and Purpose

LINK



I noticed this argument and found it worth sharing: 

1. Either (a) the purposes God sets for our lives are significant because God wills them, or (b) God wills them because they're significant.

2. If (a), then what counts as a significant life is arbitrary.

3. If (b), then what counts as a significant life is independent of God

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4. Therefore, what counts as a significant life is either arbitrary or independent of God.

Chris Hallquist vs. William Lane Craig on Dishonesty: Part 2

Now that Chris Hallquist has accepted my summary of his allegations about William Lane Craig's honesty, I want to review each allegation in detail to determine if it is justified.



In order to maximize the readability of this post, I'm going to repeat a lot of what I wrote in the last post but add my assessment where appropriate. For each alleged example, my old comments will appear in a section or paragraph marked as "Background." This will then be followed by a section or paragraph marked, "Discussion," followed by a brief one-line summary titled, "Verdict." But before I do that, I want to review my guiding principles.





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Advice to Christians Who Want to Dialogue with Atheists: Don't Use the Word "Faith"

There are times where two people speak the same language, use the same words, and mean very different things by the same words. In conversations between Christians and atheists, "faith" is one such word. For many atheists, the word "faith" means, by default, belief without evidence or even belief against the evidence. In contrast, I doubt many Christians would accept that definition. For example, according to the NIV translation, Hebrews 11:1 states, "Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see."





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Did William Lane Craig Confuse "Pornographic" with "Profane"?

In an earlier post, I reported that William Lane Craig had written that Internet Infidels sites "are literally pornographic (evil writing)."





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ex-apologist: A Quick Euthyphro Dilemma Reply to Craig's Argument Against Atheistic Meaning and Purpose

LINK

Chris Hallquist vs. William Lane Craig on Dishonesty: Part 1

Christopher Hallquist recently finished a series of blog posts about William Lane Craig. In addition to providing objections to Craig's various arguments, Hallquist also accuses Craig of dishonesty in his work. In this post, I want to review Hallquist's evidence for that accusation and figure out if the accusation is justified.



Here is an outline of my basic plan.


Review the definitions of honest, honesty, dishonesty, misrepresent, lie.
Summarize Hallquist's allegations of dishonesty.
Assess Hallquist's evidence for those allegations.



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Jehovah is a Sexist - Part 3

What is sexism?  What is a sexist?  These questions have been around for quite some time now, so there are, no doubt, some well-thought-out answers to these questions.  But before I consult experts on conceptual issues, I like to do a bit of thinking for myself.







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Two Old Posts about the Sensus Divinitatis

"Theism and the Genetic Fallacy, Part II" by Keith Parsons

Parsons turns the tables on Alvin Plantinga and argues that the non-existence of a sensus divinitatis is evidence for the non-existence of God.

"An Empirical Test of the Existence of Sensus Divintatus in Atheists" by Jim Lippard

If there is really an innate universal belief in God--or a natural direct perception of God, a sensus divinitatis,
a mental faculty that allows direct basic knowledge of God's
existence--it seems to me that we should be able to find much stronger
empirical evidence of it.

Definition of Friendly Atheist

This is a quick post about the definition of "friendly atheist."



Purdue University Emeritus Professor of Philosophy William Rowe famously coined the terms, "friendly atheist," "indifferent atheist," and "unfriendly atheist."[1] What did he mean by these terms?



unfriendly atheist : an atheist who believes no one is justified in believing that the theistic God exists

indifferent atheist : an atheist who holds no belief concerning whether any theist is or is not rationally justified in believing that the theistic God exists

friendly atheist : an atheist who believes that some theists are rationally justified in believing the theistic God exists



Boston University Emeritus Professor of Philosophy Michael Martin wrote a critique of Rowe's argument for friendly atheism. What do you think of Martin's critique?



Notes



[1] William L. Rowe, "The Problem of Evil and Some Varieties of Atheism" American Philosophical Quarterly 16 (1979), 335-341.