Our feedback this week is from Colin who had previously claimed that the Bible was not historically reliable. He continues his case here, along with my responses in purple. He made a lot of assertions and copied various internet links. But did he present any actual evidence for his claims?
Colin> Hi Dr Lisle,
Colin> Thx deeply for your very kind and long reply!
Dr. Lisle: You are most welcome. I appreciate your follow-up, but I noticed that you didn’t answer any of the questions I put to you. Perhaps I should explain the following. In order for us to have a rational dialog, you will need to answer my questions and respond to my points, just as I have provided answers to your questions and responded to your claims. The basis of a rational dialog is not simply to assert opinions and link to youtube videos. Rather, it is to provide evidence – to show that you have a good reason for believing in your position. I have done this, albeit briefly, and have challenged you to do the same. But so far, you haven’t offered any actual evidence for your beliefs.
Perhaps I should also explain that youtube videos and rationalwiki links do not constitute evidence because these are merely (non-peer-reviewed) opinions. Anyone can post any absurd, unfounded idea on those sites. That’s not science. Suppose two people were debating what 1+4 equals. One person asserts that the answer is 5 and demonstrates this with evidence. He produces an apple, then adds four more, and counts the total as 5. That is sensible. The other person asserts that the answer is clearly 13. But instead of making a rational argument, he merely posts links to internet pages and youtube videos that repeat this incorrect view. That is not evidence, it merely repeats the absurd opinion of others. So I am not interested in reading the opinions of people who don’t know what they are talking about. I want to know if you have a logical reason for your position. To be honest, I don’t think you do. I suspect you have blindly accepted what you have read on the internet and seen on youtube. But I would like to give you the opportunity to prove me wrong. But for that, you will need to produce actual evidence.
And you will need to answer the questions I put to you previously. In particular, I asked, “What gave you the impression that the Bible is historized fiction?” I want to know if you have a rational reason to believe that, or if you are blindly parroting what you heard someone else say. Also, I asked, “As a matter of procedure, how do you know what happened in the distant past so that you can check the record of the Bible?” This is important because your answer will reveal your ability to discern truth from error in historical matters.
I asked you to test the Bible’s scientific claim that what you sow is what you reap. Did you try the experiment, or at least read up on what others have done in this area? Do you now agree that the Bible is right about this scientific claim? I asked if you could cite any examples of things that have a beginning but no cause. Can you? I asked if you could provide any examples to back up your claim that I have taken probability “out of context from reality.” Can you show me an example in any of my articles or books where I have done so?
I have asked how you can make sense of moral accountability in an evolutionary worldview. I asked, “if we are just the unplanned product of chemistry over time as Darwin believed, then how could anything be ‘right’ or ‘wrong?’” I wrote, “You wouldn’t chastise baking soda for fizzing when it reacts with vinegar would you? Then why criticize a person for being disingenuous, if he or she is just a complex chemical reaction? Why not be disingenuous if it helps you survive?” I asked, “on the evolutionary worldview, why should I (an unplanned bundle of chemicals) be honest or courageous?” I asked, “Do you have any evidence at all for your position?”
Also, I asked if you could answer the presuppositional challenge: if you can rationally justify the preconditions for knowledge within your own worldview. I have shown that only the biblical worldview can make sense of the procedures of science. To be rational, you must either justify your confidence in science within your worldview, or relinquish science. Now, on to the specifics:
Colin> As you are a Scientist,you use Science,albeit wrongly, to support your theistic Paradigm…
Dr. Lisle: That is not really accurate. It is not science that supports my worldview. Rather, it is my worldview that supports science. Only the Christian worldview can justify our confidence in the scientific method. I have explained this here: https://biblicalscienceinstitute.com/apologetics/evolution-vs-science/
Colin>Colin> distinguished Christian Lawyers without training in Science,lo and behold,use their Legal Criteria to validate the Bible…
Dr. Lisle: There are many lines of evidence that confirm Scripture. Naturally, people will tend to focus on those lines of evidence that are in line with their educational background. There is nothing wrong with that providing the arguments they make are rational.
Colin> but we can show they are are all misguided and bias:Objection!
Dr. Lisle: Can you indeed show that they are misguided, or are you merely asserting it? How do you know that their bias is incorrect?
Colin> The Resurrection of Jesus Is Not a Court Case
Dr. Lisle: I actually agree with that statement, but probably not in the way you intended. The resurrection of Jesus is an historical fact. It’s recorded history, and not a court case.
Colin> A longstanding trend and slogan in apologetics is to frame the divinity and resurrection of Jesus as a court case. Well-published authors popularizing this comparison include Josh McDowell in Evide…
Dr. Lisle: You have committed the fallacy of irrelevant thesis because I do not use this approach. That is, I do not claim that the divinity and resurrection of Jesus is a matter of dispute; rather I claim these are historical facts. We dare not put God on trial, because on judgment day, you are the one on trial, not God.
Colin> However, you are mistaken as most Ancient Historians don’t believe the Bible is valid or historically reliable!
Dr. Lisle: First, that’s the fallacy of appeal to majority. Majority opinion doesn’t determine truth. Second, it’s not true as I already showed. Ancient historians (historians who lived long ago) generally did believe the Bible to be historically accurate. I already refuted your claim last time by mentioning a couple. Have you read any of the works of Josephus? Even modern historians largely embrace the historicity of the Bible, although secularists reject the supernatural elements. Even very secular sources, such as the Smithsonian, admit that the Bible is largely historically accurate, stating, “…much of the Bible, in particular the historical books of the old testament, are as accurate historical documents as any that we have from antiquity and are in fact more accurate than many of the Egyptian, Mesopotamian, or Greek histories…. These Biblical records can be and are used as are other ancient documents in archeological work. For the most part, historical events described took place and the peoples cited really existed.”
Colin> Any published papers by you in ID etc would not be accepted or validated by the Royal Society or the American Academy…
Dr. Lisle: You mean to tell me that secular societies who reject God and all things biblical and embrace evolution without question would not accept a paper that challenges their entire paradigm? How surprising! But irrelevant. Of course people who are biased against creation are generally unwilling to consider an argument for it. That’s human nature. But it has no bearing whatsoever on the actual evidence.
Colin> why… because it is Religion not Science!
Dr. Lisle: That’s not the reason. But I agree that religion is not the same as science. Take the atheistic religion for example. In that religion, the universe is not designed, but simply something that happened for no logical reason, and the human mind is just chemical reactions that evolved over millions of years. If that were true, then how would science even be possible? Why expect to find patterns in nature if there is no mind behind nature? Why expect that the human mind can discover patterns if our mind is just chemical reactions that developed by chance? On the other hand, the Christian worldview makes sense of science as I show here: https://biblicalscienceinstitute.com/apologetics/evolution-vs-science/
Science is not the same as religion, but science is founded on the Christian religion and would make no sense apart from it.
Colin> If you attended a Biology Convention…and doubted Evolution,they would laugh at you…then questions your sanity and credentials!
Dr. Lisle: So what? They laughed at Galileo too. But he was right. Truth and science have nothing to do with what people laugh at, and how they try to bully the opposition. It seems to me Colin that you are far more concerned with what people will think of you than you are with reality. I’m going to go with the worldview that makes science possible, and if that causes some people to laugh at me, well, that’s their problem. People often mock when they cannot refute a position logically. Mocking and ad hominem attacks are the last resort of those people who have absurd beliefs.
Furthermore, I have attended creation biology conferences where Ph.D. biologist presented powerful scientific evidence that confirms creation. These scholars would not take evolution seriously. (Although out of courtesy, we would not mock those who disagree with us, even if their beliefs are absurd).
Colin> So this creationist [vulgarity removed] named [name withheld] kept polluting my comments section with ravings about how we’re near the center of the universe, how Dr. Russel…
Dr. Lisle: I’m mildly curious how you think you know that we are NOT near the center of the universe. What evidence from astronomy do you have to support your conclusion? I ask because I have studied this issue for some time, and I don’t know the answer. Please enlighten me: how do you know?
Colin> Scientists counter the claims of intelligent design proponents.
Dr. Lisle: Scientists counter the claims of evolutionists.
Colin> Here is an excellent documentary on the “controversy” surrounding evolution called “Judgment …
Dr. Lisle: Again, I’m not interested in the opinions of evolutionists. Rather, I want to know if you have any actual scientific evidence for your position. Can you produce a rational argument?
Colin> Watch Dr Richard Carrier destroy these Theists as he would destroy and refute your claims for God or Creationism:
Dr. Lisle: Actually atheism was refuted decades ago in the famous Bahnsen-Stein debate: http://datpostmil.com/the-great-debate-greg-bahnsen-vs-gordon-stein/
Did you find any flaw in Dr. Bahnsen’s argument?
Colin> You should stop misrepresenting the Bible and engage with real facts…
Dr. Lisle: That’s exactly what I was thinking about you! Aren’t you the one misrepresenting the Bible, claiming that it was not historical? If the Bible is not historical, then how do you deal with the archeological facts that confirm it, such as the excavation of Jericho, the city of Ai, and Sodom, to name a few? Are you going to deny those real facts, or engage with them?
Colin> moreover,stop telling Nature how to act…
Dr. Lisle: As an astrophysicist, my job is to discover how nature acts, not to tell it how to act. The reason I am able to discover patterns in nature is because God has placed them there. He upholds the universe in a consistent and rational way that the human mind is able to systematically explore. But if the universe were just chance, how would science be possible?
Colin> mysteries abound in Science…
Dr. Lisle: Of course. But science is only justified within the Christian worldview, as I mentioned above. In other words, if the Bible were not true, it would be irrational to think that science has anything to do with reality.
Colin>Colin> citing God when problems get hard is lazy thinking!
Dr. Lisle: That’s a straw-man fallacy because it is not my position. Please do not continue to misrepresent me. God is not the reason for what we cannot discover in science; rather God is the reason for what we CAN discover in science. I have explained this here: https://biblicalscienceinstitute.com/apologetics/evolution-vs-science/
Have a read and see if you can justify science without invoking the biblical God.
Colin> We know in principle how RNA and DNA formed…
Dr. Lisle: Really? How? Science has shown that DNA is always replicated from previous DNA by enzymes in the cell; but the instructions to make the enzymes are encoded in the DNA. So DNA requires enzymes, and the enzymes require DNA. Which evolved first? Each cannot survive without the other. So how did the first DNA come about?
Colin> but neither you nor Evolutionary Biologists can go back 4 Billion Years necessary for Evolution to work!
Dr. Lisle: Quite right. The only person to witness the origin of life is God. And He has told us how it came to be. You can reject that eye-witness testimony in favor of guesswork, but would that be rational?
Colin> Dr Richard Carrier has looked at your claims and found them bizarre and false as Experts would!<./span>
Dr. Lisle: I have looked at evolutionary claims and found them bizarre and false, as many other Ph.D. experts would agree with me. But this again is just opinions. Do you have any evidence for your position? Anything?
Colin> There were mysteries in the 19C…there are mysteries now… inevitably they will find solutions…
Dr. Lisle: In the Christian worldview we would expect to discover the answers to many of the mysteries in nature because God upholds the universe in a consistent way and has given us the gift of rationality, along with sensory organs that are basically reliable. Namely, we can observe nature, consciously consider the evidence and evaluate it. But apart from the Christian worldview, how would science make any sense? Why would you have any confidence whatsoever that one chemical accident should be able to systematically probe and understand another accident? Science is predicated upon the Christian worldview, and makes no sense apart from it.
Colin> …with natural not supernatural explanations…
Dr. Lisle: If the biblical God did not exist, then there could be no explanations of any kind for anything. The reason is that there would be no basis for universal invariant laws of logic by which we reason, the rationality of the mind, nor any basis for expecting underlying orderliness in nature. Why expect to have reasons for things in a chance universe?! It would make no sense.
I also suspect you are again misunderstanding the biblical position, and are therefore inadvertently misrepresenting it. So let me clarify. I believe in natural explanations. “Natural” refers to the ordinary, systematic way that God upholds His universe. “Supernatural” refers to an unusual and extraordinary act of God. In the Christian worldview both the “natural” and “supernatural” are equally demonstrations of God’s power. Therefore, by definition, supernatural actions of God are rare, and natural actions of God are common. Since God is logical and thinks mathematically, we can often write down equations that describe the consistent way He causes things to work. Gravity is the consistent way God causes masses to attract, electromagnetism is the way that God causes charged particles to move in response to fields, and so on.
The reason I mention this is because it sounds like you think Christians are against natural law, when in fact, Christianity is the only rational basis for natural law. Think about it: why would there be laws of nature if there is no law-giver? Why expect the universe to be rational if there is no mind behind it? Christians therefore expect to find natural explanations for the way the universe normally behaves because the universe obeys God’s decree. But in the secular worldview, there would be no rational basis for expecting a natural explanation for anything! So your expectation that science will find natural explanations for things is a Christian presupposition. This belief shows that in your heart-of-hearts, you really do know God.
Colin> …we can’t actually test for the Supernatural!
Dr. Lisle: Why not? We may not definitively know if an action of God should be classified as natural or supernatural because we don’t know what all the laws of nature are. But we do know that God exists because apart from Him we would not expect to have any explanations for anything. All scientific testing presupposes that God upholds creation in a basically consistent way for our benefit.
Colin> So your evidence is nonsense and false!
Dr. Lisle: It’s an interesting assertion. But can you produce any actual evidence that the evidence I have presented is false? For example, I provided evidence that the Bible is right when it states that you reap what you sow – that corn begets corn. Can you demonstrate that this evidence is false? Can you justify the principle of induction apart from the Christian worldview? All science rests upon induction, and yet it is without rational merit apart from the Bible.
Colin> Most Philosophers and most Scientists don’t accept Evolution is false…
Dr. Lisle: Most philosophers and scientists didn’t accept Aristarchus’s arguments for a heliocentric solar system at the time. But he was right and they were wrong. Colin, it seems that you believe things just because other people do, rather than for rational reasons. This is called the fallacy of the appeal to majority. It is an error in reasoning because the majority of people are often wrong about things. You might want to read up on the history of science because it is full of examples.
Colin> Prof Ken Miller is a Christian…
Dr. Lisle: Ken Miller is actually Roman Catholic; whether he professes Christ as the sole means by which God saves by grace alone through faith alone apart from good works, I do not know. In any case, he does not accept what the Bible teaches about creation.
Colin> he has refuted ID in Court!
Dr. Lisle: Are you now trying to frame the issue as a court case – the very thing you argued against earlier? In any case, judges and juries do not determine scientific truth.
Colin> What you fail to understand is that Theologians and Ancient Historians use different Methods…
Dr. Lisle: In general, different fields of study use different methods to discover truth. But in all cases, evidence is better than opinions. Do you have any actual evidence of your position? Or do you just believe on the basis of other people’s opinions?
Colin> modern Historical methods not bias!!
Dr. Lisle: Everyone has biases because we all have a worldview – a way of thinking that affects our interpretation of the evidence. A correct bias will help us draw correct conclusions from evidence, whereas an incorrect bias will hinder our interpretation. So the question is not “who is biased” but rather “which bias is the best bias which with to be biased?” Should we embrace recorded history as we interpret historical evidence? Or should we reject recorded history due to our philosophical preferences and instead interpret the data according to our arbitrary conjectures?
Colin> William Lane Craig used Bayes Theorem to show God is likely…he withdrew it when Experts found a flaw!
Dr. Lisle: I reject Craig’s approach to apologetics. So this is another straw-man fallacy. My argument is that science would be impossible apart from the Christian worldview. So, if you are going to refute me, you will have to deal with my argument, and not another that I reject.
Colin> He also uses the Syllogism for Induction and existence wrongly,too
Dr. Lisle: That is the fallacy of irrelevant thesis, because I do not use Craig’s arguments for God.
Colin> You might be an Expert in Astronomy,you are no Expert in Philosophy or Mathematical Stats or Ancient History:
Dr. Lisle: Just so you know, a Ph.D. in astrophysics includes graduate level courses in statistics. With regard to philosophy, you are right – I am not an expert. However, Dr. Greg Bahnsen was. His Ph.D. was in philosophy, and he was the one the disproved atheism in the debate I referenced above. Can you refute his argument? With regard to ancient history, Josephus was a first-century historian that was very knowledgeable particularly of Jewish history. Have you read any of his works, such as the “Antiquities of the Jews?”
Colin> Argument from Miracles – Debunked (Miracles Explained)
Dr. Lisle: Another straw-man fallacy. I really wish you would stop misrepresenting my position. I don’t argue for God on the basis of miracles. I accept miracles, and that some of them might be temporary suspensions of natural law. But it is the existence of natural laws (not their suspension) that proves the biblical God. After all, how can you possibly justify the existence of universal natural laws that are mathematical in nature and persist over time? Why would a chance universe obey any laws whatsoever? Can you answer any of these questions rationally?
Colin> Macroevolution Cannot Occur – Debunked
Dr. Lisle: Do you have any actual evidence to back up this claim – that macroevolution can occur?
Colin> Five Bogus Reasons to Trust the Bible • Richard Carrier
Dr. Lisle: Colin, instead of straw-man arguments, how about dealing with my actual argument? I have demonstrated that science would be rationally unjustified apart from the Christian worldview. https://biblicalscienceinstitute.com/apologetics/evolution-vs-science/ So, unless you are willing to give up science, you should believe the Bible. Can you refute this?
Colin> Sean McDowell (yes, son of the Josh McDowell of Evidence That Demands a Verdict fame, now in a co-written new edition) has been Tweeting some eye-rolling propaganda to miseducate the public and keep conning Christians to stay in the fold. Just like a
Dr. Lisle: This is another fallacy of irrelevant thesis. Even if it is true, it is entirely irrelevant to the position that the Bible is true, and has no bearing on the evidence that I have presented.
Colin> Jason Lisle – RationalWiki
Dr. Lisle: Rationalwiki is a non-peer-reviewed website run by atheists and is notoriously unreliable. Is this where you’ve been getting your information? No wonder you are confused. Instead of blindly accepting what your have read on atheist web sites, why not actually look at the evidence and apply rational thought to it?
Colin> You have a Cognitive Bias in favour of a young Earth which is utterly false…as greater Minds have shown!
Dr. Lisle: Interesting assertion. Care to provide any actual evidence to back it up? No? Then I might as well assert the opposite. You have a cognitive bias in favor of an old Earth which is utterly false…as greater minds have shown! The difference is, I can back up my claim. For example, carbon-14 is found in coal, diamonds, dinosaur remains, and so on – things buried deep within the earth and claimed to be millions of years old. Yet, c14 has a half-life of 5730 years. This demonstrates that the Earth is much younger than even one-million years. Or consider the decay of Earth’s magnetic field as it has been empirically measured. The evidence fits an exponential decay with a half-life of about 1200 years, which limits the age of the Earth to a few thousand years. Many other lines of evidence confirm a young earth. Now, are you going to accept that evidence, or deny it in favor of your cognitive bias?
Colin> Life or order are not so rare as to need a Creator…
Dr. Lisle: Another straw-man argument. My argument for the biblical God is not based on “order.” That being said, creative information always comes from a mind. And DNA has creative information in it – the instructions to produce the organism. So scientifically, DNA cannot have come about by an evolutionary process. See the works of Dr. Werner Gitt, or Dr. Lee Spetner for details on this.
Colin> again Prof of Mathematical Sciences at Imperial College has shown you are bias!
Dr. Lisle: Hehe. You don’t need to be a math professor to show that I am biased. I freely admit that I and every person on earth are biased. That includes you. You have a bias for an evolutionary, naturalistic worldview. My bias is for a Christian theistic worldview. The question is: which bias can make sense of science? I claim that only the Christian bias can. Your bias is therefore inconsistent with your expectation that science is a useful tool for testing certain kinds of truth claims. Your worldview is contradictory with itself, and therefore wrong.
Colin> If there was anything illogical or unscientific about Evolution….honest Evolutionary Scientists.. who want the truth…would say so…they dont…
Dr. Lisle: Actually, they do! Consider, for example, Michael Behe’s book “Darwin’s Black Box.” Behe does believe that all life evolved from a common ancestor, and yet he points out devastating problems with the theory. Have you read this book?
Colin> it is you who are bias,
Dr. Lisle: We both are. You are steeped in naturalistic, secular thinking, and I don’t think you even realize it. I have a Christian worldview – which is a bias – but it is a bias that makes sense of science, morality, rationality, logic, etc. Your bias would make nonsense of science, morality, rationality, and logic.
Colin> so I believe you are lying because you are in love with God not reality!
Dr. Lisle: I’ll ask again, why would lying be wrong in your worldview? If I am just an unplanned, non-designed bag of chemicals, how could anything I do be morally right or wrong? Chemicals just do what they do according to the fixed laws of physics. There is no right or wrong about it, and chemicals have no choice. If I am just chemistry, then I have no genuine choice in what I believe or say. So your moral indignation makes no sense given your professed worldview. It shows that in your heart-of-hearts, you really do know God. But you hate Him.
Reality is exactly what God determines it to be. His mind controls this universe, similar in some respects to the way your mind determines your own daydreams. Therefore, to love God is to embrace reality. To hate God is to deny reality.
Colin> Jesus was so miraculous, he overcame death but could not write his own Story…
Dr. Lisle: A person chooses not to do something and therefore he cannot do it? What an absurd assertion! Jesus gave men the honor of writing the Gospels, just as God in did in the Old Testament. If Jesus had written His own biography, people would be less inclined to believe it. But Christ’s ministry was very public. It was observed by many, and four people recorded many of the details, thereby corroborating each other.
Colin> he left it to Scribes to lie and forge!!
Dr. Lisle: What evidence do you have for your assertion that the authors of the Gospel lied? How do you know what “really” happened so that you can say for certain that the Gospels are wrong? Surely you are not rejecting recorded history just because it goes against your cognitive bias, are you? Moreover, your assertion makes no sense. Let’s think this through. Did you know that with the exception of John the authors of the Gospels were martyred? They believed so strongly in Jesus that they were willing to die rather than recant. Does that sound like people who were lying?
Colin> He also allows Suffering without any reason or explanation…
Dr. Lisle: On the contrary. The Bible gives a very good reason for suffering – it is the right consequence of our rebellion against God. God made a world that was very good and put human beings in charge of it. God told Adam what the consequences of sin would be, and Adam freely chose to sin. Why does God allow suffering? It is because that is what we wanted. We asked for it, and God granted our request.
But notice here that your objection is absurd. The form of your argument is basically this: “I don’t understand why God does _____, therefore God doesn’t exist.” But how is that remotely logical? Consider someone who says, “I don’t understand why Joe puts so much sugar on his cereal. Therefore, Joe doesn’t exist.” Does the existence of something require us to understand it? Did gravity not exist before people figured out how it worked?
You see, your objection to God is emotional – not logical. You reject God because you hate Him, not because you have a rational reason to disbelieve in Him. The Bible itself teaches that this is the case in Romans 1:18-25.
Colin> the Bible is contradictory on this as Prof Bart Erhman found…he too was a fundamentalistic Christian until he checked his Sources!!
Dr. Lisle: Nope. The Bible does not contain contradictions, as I demonstrated in my book “Keeping Faith in an Age of Reason” – which is available on our web store. I analyzed the claims and found that not even one was a genuine contradiction. It’s just that most critics of the Bible don’t know what a contradiction is, and have not studied logic, nor the Bible in any depth.
By the way, your objection assumes laws of logic – which are only justified in the Christian worldview. For example, the reason that two contradictory statements cannot both be true is because truth corresponds to the mind of God (Colossians 2:3) and God cannot deny Himself (2 Timothy 2:13). Since God is omni-present, sovereign, and unchanging, we can trust that the law of non-contradiction will be true at all times, in all locations in the universe. But if the Bible were not true, there would be no basis for a law of non-contradiction (or any law of logic) nor its properties. Apart from the Bible, how can you possibly know that it will always be the case everywhere that two contradictions cannot both be true?
Colin> Both Einstein and Bertrand Russell didn’t believe in Creators…they won Nobel Prizes!
Dr. Lisle: Oh my, how irrelevant! Besides, many Nobel Prize winners have been Christians, such as Lorentz, Anton von Lenard, J. Thomson, von Laue, Bragg, Barkla, Stark, Hertz, Compton, Heisenberg, Hess, G. Thomson, Cockcroft, Walton, Purcell, Zernik, Born, Bothe, Lamb, Kusch, Frank, Goeppert-Mayer, Jensen, Townes, Hewish, Cronin, Osheroff, and Phillips. And that’s just for the Nobel Prize in physics. Christian Nobel prize winners far outnumber atheist Nobel prize winners. By the way, Einstein was a deist – he did believe in a Creator. But again, what I want to see is some actual evidence for your position.
Colin> We have 3000 invented Gods,over 4,000 invented Religions..even the clever Greeks invented them….so Humans are very good at self deception and inventing Gods:
Dr. Lisle: I agree. Most religions – atheism, Islam, Mormonism, Hinduism, etc. are just the arbitrary preferences of the holder. Most of them arbitrarily reject the recorded history of the Bible, even though the information in Scripture is what justifies our confidence in science, morality, logic, and so on. Yet, people do embrace logic, science, morality, showing that they do know the biblical God in their heart of hearts. They deny what they know must be true. They are indeed self-deceived. Did you know that the Bible discusses this topic in James chapter 1? Those who read or hear biblical truth, and yet continue to act as if the Bible is not true are self-deceived (James 1:22-24).
Colin> Regarding ultimate Causes:We don’t know Reality needs a cause…that’s a classic Fallacy of Composition!
Dr. Lisle: As I explained previously, it is not a fallacy of composition because it is not composing anything. You are confused because there is a way of constructing the argument that would be a fallacy of composition – but that is not the way I constructed the argument. Things that have a beginning require a cause. (You do accept this, otherwise you would not have replied to me; you would have assumed that my reply to you was possibly uncaused rather than having been written by me.) The universe has a beginning. Therefore, the universe requires a cause. This is a valid and sound categorical syllogism.
Colin> If God needs no cause and we need a cause for existence,we have an epistemic contradiction!
Dr. Lisle: I don’t know if you are not reading carefully, or not thinking carefully, or both. Things that have a beginning require a cause. That’s basic cause-and-effect. The universe has a beginning and therefore requires a cause. God has no beginning and therefore cannot have a cause. Think about it: if something is eternal then it cannot have a preceding cause, otherwise it would not be eternal!
Colin> The Universe was not designed for us…just pop into Space without a Suit!
Dr. Lisle: Again, you are just not thinking clearly and continue to misrepresent the biblical position (and it isn’t ethical to misrepresent someone else’s position by the way). The Bible teaches that God formed the EARTH to be inhabited (Isaiah 45:18), not outer space. Nevertheless, the universe beyond Earth must have the correct laws of physics and physical constants in order for the Earth to exist and for life to exist on its surface! That’s the point. The laws of nature and physical constant have to be just right in order for things like atoms to exist. Change the nuclear strong force just a bit, and the only atoms that exist will be hydrogen, or none at all. Change the mass of the down quark just slightly, and all matter would disintegrate into neutrons. You would be astonished to learn just how precisely the laws of nature and physical constants have to be in order for life to exist.
Colin> None takes you seriously as a Scientist…
Dr. Lisle: Really? Then how did I get a Ph.D. in the first place? How did I get papers published in Solar Physics, Astrophysical Journal, etc.? Besides, I am far more concerned with what is true than being accepted by others. Your statement here again suggests the reason that you reject the Christian worldview; it’s not for logical reasons but rather because you think you will be better accepted by secularists.
Colin> because it is immoral to go around America lying to our children…the next Generation.
Dr. Lisle: That’s why I am very careful to be truthful. But, hypothetically, if I were lying, why in your worldview would that be wrong? In an evolutionary worldview, children are just non-designed blobs of chemicals that happened by chance in a chance universe. Why would it be wrong to lie to chemical accidents, particularly if it benefits my survival?
Colin> ..as Dr William Lane Craig does: e.g. Response to Craig’s crit of my paper on the existence of Jesus. A while back, William Lane Craig responded to an argument of mine that was published in 2011 in Faith and Philosophy in a paper called “Evidence, Miracles, and The Existence of Jesus”. (Craig’s response appears on his Reasonable Faith website here).
Dr. Lisle: I don’t remotely care what Craig says because he and I are not on the same page. I want to know if you can refute my argument – not Craig’s. I could cite some evolutionists who have made very bad arguments for evolution – but that wouldn’t necessarily refute your position, would it?
Colin> The Sean Carroll case is another: Timothy Keller: Dishonest Reasons for God (Chapter 8) • Richard Carrier
Dr. Lisle: Again, this is the fallacy of irrelevant thesis. MY reason for believing in God is that it makes knowledge possible – knowledge of science, morality, logic, and so forth. That is the argument I don’t think you can refute. I don’t care why other people believe in God; they may have good reasons or bad reasons, but that is utterly irrelevant to my argument.
Colin> I began my critique of Keller’s The Reason for God with an exposé of everything up through Chapter 1, then Chapter 2, Chapters 3 through 5, Chapter 6, and Chapter 7. Here I will cover Chapter 8—and some material he adds in between Chapters 7 and 8. N
Dr. Lisle: This is entirely irrelevant to my argument. Can you refute my argument by justifying logic, science, and morality without the Christian worldview? So far no one has been able to do this.
Colin> Another example: All Godless Universes Are Mathematical • Richard Carrier
Dr. Lisle: On the contrary, mathematics cannot possibly be justified in any atheistic universe. The reason is that mathematics involves the universal, unchanging logic of numbers. Numbers are concepts of quantity. Concepts require a mind. Hence, mathematics cannot exist without a mind. And given that laws of mathematics are universal and unchanging, the mind responsible for them must be universal and unchanging, just as the mind of God is. But if there is no God – no universal unchanging mind, then neither can there be a universal unchanging logic of numbers. Even if there were universal principles in an atheistic universe (for whatever reason), we as finite creatures could never know about them because all our experiences are particular. We could never have justification for any universal, and hence we could not justify mathematics.
Colin> At futurism.com, there is a brief article explaining why the universe is mathematical, by saying, essentially just, that’s what we invented math for, to explain the universe. But this isn’t really an answer to the question. Theists have long used the
Dr. Lisle: I agree that such an explanation doesn’t answer the question. The Nobel Prize winning physicist Eugene Wigner wrote a wonderful article pointing out that mathematics as the language of the universe makes no sense from (his) secular worldview. See “The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences.” Mathematics is only reasonable in the Christian worldview.
Colin> Another: The Case for Christ: The Movie! • Richard Carrier
Dr. Lisle: Irrelevant. That’s not my argument.
Colin> From Dr Richard Carrier BA,MA,MPhil,PhD:
Dr. Lisle: Irrelevant. I’m not interested in the opinions of others – only evidence. Are any of your claims based on actual evidence? Or do you merely blindly accept the opinions of evolutionists?
Colin> You,too, are merely indoctrinated so must superimpose your Theistic Paradigm on everything!
Dr. Lisle: I could equally assert: “You are merely indoctrinated such that you must impose your atheistic paradigm on everything.” But the difference is: I have provided a rational argument and evidence for my paradigm. However, all you have done is made assertions without evidence and link to others who make assertions without evidence. Do you see the difference?
Colin> You must have seen yourself on “Why We Laugh at Creationists” where you are actually lying and inventing evidence that most rational Scientists would not accept!
Dr. Lisle: People often laugh and mock their opposition when they cannot give any rational refutation or evidence. I’m curious, what evidence do you think I have “invented?” Hypothetically, if I were lying, why in your worldview would that be wrong? If I am just a chemical accident, and all my thoughts and actions are determined by the chemistry of my brain, then I really don’t have any genuine choice in anything I do. Right? The notion that lying is wrong is based on the Bible, because lying is contrary to the nature of God.
Colin> Experts who speak 10 + Languages know the OT is Myth…
Dr. Lisle: (1) How do they “know” it is myth? Were they there to witness that such events did not really happen? (2) How is being multi-lingual even remotely relevant to knowledge of what happened in the distant past? This would seem to be another fallacy of irrelevant thesis. Also, again, you seem to base your beliefs arbitrarily on the beliefs of others, rather than evidence. Do you have any actual evidence whatsoever that the Old Testament is myth?
Colin> you can’t conflate authenticity with credibility…as that is just as fallacious as stating Sherlock Holmes existed because London does!
Dr. Lisle: I don’t. So this is another straw-man fallacy.
Colin> If Genesis was Science or Divine…where is Einstein’s Field Equations etc…
Dr. Lisle: Even you must realize how silly that argument is. Genesis is a history book. You reject it because it doesn’t have advanced equations in it? Do you also reject all other history books because they don’t come with equations? Again your argument is essentially “I don’t understand why God wouldn’t do _______ [include modern physics equations in a history book], therefore God didn’t really write the Bible.” But how would that even remotely follow logically?
Colin> no Ancient would understand…that would be evidence for ID or God!
Dr. Lisle: Not for the biblical God. God is not the author of confusion, and therefore He would not write a book that could not be understood by the audience to whom He is writing. There are scientific insights in the Bible of course, but these were understandable to the original audience.
Colin>Colin> According to my Minister pal Dr Andrew Knight(PhD in Evolutionary Genetics)”Evolution is true….the Bible was not written as a Science Book”
Dr. Lisle: According to God, evolution is false and the Bible is historically accurate. By the way, I agree that the Bible is not written as a science book. Rather, it is written primarily as a history book. But since it is divinely inspired, when it touches on matters of science, it does so correctly. Thus, the Earth really is round (Isaiah 40:22, Job 26:10) and floats in space (Job 26:7), the universe really has been expanded (Isaiah 40:22), the number of stars is humanly uncountable (Jeremiah 33:22), and so on.
Colin> The pattern behind self-deception | Michael Shermer
Dr. Lisle: The Bible explains self-deception (James 1:22). Self-deception has to do with the fact that we are both (1) made in the image of God and (2) have rebelled against God. Since we are made in God’s image, and since God has revealed Himself to us, we know God and His righteous standard. But as rebels, we hate God and His standard; we don’t want to know God. Therefore, we misconstrue the evidence so that we can believe that we don’t believe in God. Dr. Greg Bahnsen did his doctoral dissertation on this very topic. I highly recommend it.
Colin> based on terror management theory. Michael Shermer says the human tendency to believe strange things — from alien abductions to dowsing rods — boils down t…
Dr. Lisle: People are right to be terrified at an all-powerful God who is righteous and therefore rightly angry at them for their high treason. To manage that terror, they construct false worldviews, and invent a God they can appease through good works or sacrifice, or they deny God altogether and absurdly claim that the universe and life just happened by chance. These are strange beliefs indeed, but people would rather believe in the absurd than accept the truth of the living God.
Colin> Professor Peter Millican | God does NOT exist
Dr. Lisle: God says atheists do not exist (Romans 1:18-20). That is, even those who call themselves “atheists” really do believe in God, though they verbally deny it. But their suppressed knowledge of God is revealed by their behavior: they accept that there are laws of logic, laws of nature, moral standards – none of which would make any sense apart from the biblical God.
Colin> Professor Peter Millican gives his argument against the existence of God.
Dr. Lisle: If God didn’t exist then Peter would not be able to make any argument at all. Arguments use laws of logic which cannot be justified apart from the Christian worldview. So the fact that Peter can make an argument proves that God does exist. This was demonstrated in the famous Bahnsen-Stein debate I mentioned above.
Colin> Dr Michael Shermer | God does NOT exist
Dr. Lisle: It seems that you just blindly accept whatever any atheist posts on the internet. But I’m a scientist. I care about evidence, not opinions.
Colin> Neil deGrasse Tyson: Bible Isn’t Scientific
Dr. Lisle: more opinions. Are you ever going to present any actual evidence for your beliefs?
Colin> 10 Reasons The Bible Isn’t a Well-Written Book
Dr. Lisle: Fallacy of irrelevant thesis. People’s opinions on the style of the Bible are utterly irrelevant to the truth of the Bible.
Colin> Dr. Liar, Part 2: Lisle Lies about Freshman Astronomy
Dr. Lisle: Name-calling is often the last resort of those who know they cannot defend their position rationally. You certainly have provided a long list of people who don’t know what they are talking about. But are you ever going to present any evidence for your claims?
Colin> With all due respect, the most celebrated and cited living Physicist on Earth, is Prof Ed Witten of Princeton…
Dr. Lisle: Wow – another opinion! How can my logical arguments and scientific evidence possibly stand up against all these arbitrary opinions you have presented?
Colin> he says all your claims for God etc are false…and can be early refuted!
Dr. Lisle: If my claims are false and can be easily refuted, then why can’t you refute them? Why haven’t you been able to provide any actual evidence against my position? If there were evidence for your claims, then why haven’t you presented any, instead of just citing the opinions of others?
Colin> Why don’t you debate Dr Richard Carrier or Prof Lawrence Krauss or Prof Sean Carroll…you will be easily refuted …
Dr. Lisle: I would be happy to debate them. (Of course, in your previous message you asked me to stop debating scientists.)
Colin> I think I have sent enough evidence to expose your misguided certainty and your lack of understanding of reality and History…
Dr. Lisle: Where???!!! You haven’t presented any evidence at all! All you have done is made assertions and link to other people making assertions. That isn’t evidence. I would love for you to present some actual evidence for your position. But until you do, there isn’t much to talk about.
Colin> even the cleverest Christians can be deceived…look how good Magicians are…
Dr. Lisle: Has it even occurred to you that you might be the one who is deceived? After all, you have bought into evolutionary/atheistic beliefs apparently based on no other reason than that is what other people believe.
Colin> so stop debating other self deluded Christian Scientists like Dr Hugh Ross who also lies for Science and God…
Dr. Lisle: If I am the product of evolution – as you believe – then my thoughts and subsequent actions are predetermined by the chemical reactions in my brain according to the fixed laws of physics. Therefore, on your worldview, I cannot help but to do what I do. Your advice to me to act differently presupposes the biblical worldview, where my mind is more than just chemistry and I can make genuine choices. So this shows that in your heart-of-hearts, you really do know God.
Colin> and debate Secular Experts without the biases you both have…
Dr. Lisle: I would be happy to debate scholars with secular biases. Sadly, most of them are not willing to debate me.
Colin> Please get a grip on Reality…
Dr. Lisle: Ironically, that is my advice to you.
Colin> the Bible isnt scientific or meant to be…
Dr. Lisle: First, how do you know what the Bible is “meant to be?” The science of understanding the intention of the author of a text is called “hermeneutics.” Have you studied this topic? If so, by what hermeneutical principle do you know what type of literature the Bible is intended to be?
Second, the Bible is a history book, but where it touches on science it is accurate. I gave you an example for you to test: plant corn and see what grows. The Bible teaches that corn will grow. That is a scientifically testable claim. Try it and see what happens. Then you might actually have evidence for your position rather than just assertions.
Colin> 6000 years old was a man made number…
Dr. Lisle: The six millennia number is an approximation based on information given in Scripture, along with the fact that Christ’s earthly ministry was roughly 2000 years ago.
Colin> we arnt supposed to take Genesis literally ok:
Dr. Lisle: How do you know? By what hermeneutical principle do you conclude that the author of Genesis intended for it to be taken in a non-literal fashion. (I don’t believe you have any good reason for your assertion, but I would be delighted to be proved wrong. You see, I HAVE studied hermeneutics and I have actual evidence that the author of Genesis did indeed mean for it to be taken as literal history.)
Colin> 20 Terrible Ideas from the New Testament (feat. CosmicSkeptic)
Dr. Lisle: Wow – people have opinions on things they don’t like in the Bible. But how is that remotely relevant to the truth of the Bible? I think anchovies on a pizza is a terrible idea. But does that make it false?
Colin> Scientific Proof of God? How many times has somebody professed to have scientific proof for God’s existence? Peculiar that an omnipotent god who demands worship wouldn’t grace us wit…
Dr. Lisle: God has provided irrefutable evidence for Himself; He has revealed Himself to us in such a way that we cannot help but know that creation is the work of the Creator (Romans 1:18-20). You reveal your suppressed knowledge of God whenever you rely upon science, logic, or moral standards, because none of these things could be justified apart from the biblical God.
Colin> Why Free Will Doesn’t Exist. Free will does not exist. That’s the claim I’m making, anyway. To me, it seems impossible even to imagine a world in which free will makes any sense. This vi…
Dr. Lisle: Then why bother arguing with me? The whole point of debate presupposes that human beings can freely evaluate the evidence and rationally choose the best option. If there is no free will, then I have no choice in any of beliefs (including my belief in free will), and neither do you, making any dialog pointless. Rationality would be impossible. Your view just cannot make sense of itself.
Colin> Sadly,you don’t know Ancient History!
Dr. Lisle: Do you have any evidence to back up that assertion? To be honest, it seems like you don’t know ancient history very well because you had the impression that the Bible was not historical. Yet, many of the events recorded in Scripture have been verified by other historical literature (e.g. Josephus), or by archeology. Were you unaware of this?
Colin> We have 3000 invented Gods,4000 invented Religions!
Dr. Lisle: Irrelevant, of course. I’m not interested in invented religions like atheism, Islam, etc. because these are ultimately based on arbitrary opinions rather than historical facts.
Colin> 5000 Greek,Manuscripts,12,000 Manuscripts in other languages,all written by Monks who forged and redacted the stories,100s of years later!
Dr. Lisle: Respectfully, whoever told you this doesn’t have any clue what he or she is talking about. Not only is there no evidence for such a position, but we have abundant evidence to the contrary. We have manuscript evidence for the New Testament books less than a century after they were originally written, which would make forgery impossible (“new” forged books that early would have been instantly contested by the people of the time). Fragments of the Gospel of John date to less than fifty years after the Apostle penned the original autographs. So, you see, the Bible is actually the most authenticated book of the ancient world – far more so than the works of Plato or Homer. So if you claim the Bible is forged, you would have to also claim that all other ancient books are forgeries since they are less authenticated. And if that were the case, we could know nothing about the ancient world.
Colin> The Bible isnt actually reliable or historical
Dr. Lisle: We know for a fact that what you have written here is wrong. Even honest secular scholars will admit the basic reliability of the Bible, as I showed above. Do you have any actual evidence for any of your assertions?
Colin> yet you bend Science to fit probable Fiction…
Dr. Lisle: Perhaps you think that asserting something over and over somehow counts as evidence. It doesn’t. If you want to provide evidence that the Bible is not historically accurate, then by all means provide it. Of course, you would have to know what actually happened in history in order to know that the Bible is wrong in its recorded history. So how do you know what actually happened in the past?
And of course, there is no need to bend science to fit the Bible – it already fits very naturally. We expect science to work because God upholds the universe in a consistent way for our benefit and has promised to continue to do so until judgment (Genesis 8:22). It is the secular/evolutionary view that cannot make sense of science. How would science be possible in a chance universe?
Colin> Who in the right mind would believe a Man was resurrected 2000 years ago when we have no corroboration for that.
Dr. Lisle: We have lots of corroboration for that. Four of the most well-preserved historical accounts of the ancient world all corroborate the resurrection of Christ. Surely you are not going to simply dismiss such evidence because it doesn’t fit into your bias. Are you?
Colin> no Rolling Stones existed in Christ’s day…
Dr. Lisle: That one made me chuckle. You really don’t think there were any round stones 2000 years ago? Were all stones cubes back then, but they gradually evolved into the round stones we have today? And how would you know? You do know that the Bible is not referring to the musical band, right?
Colin> no record of anyone being taken down after a Crucifixion,which would be against Roman Law!!
Dr. Lisle: Where did you get that idea? No. Crucifixion victims were not left on their cross forever – they were taken down after death as standard procedure. It was not against the law. (What was against Jewish law was for victims to remain on the cross during the Sabbath day – John 19:31)
Colin> It is actually impossible for life or the Universe to have evolved in 6000 years…
Dr. Lisle: Life didn’t evolve. Neither did the universe. They were both created. So it’s not a problem.
Colin> unless you believe in Miracles,…
Dr. Lisle: I do. They are part of recorded history. Therefore, it would be irrational to deny them.
Colin> and Science has never found any!!
Dr. Lisle: Science is the study of the way God normally upholds His universe, and is limited to testing repeatable events. Since miracles are rare one-off events, they (like historical truths) are not subject to repeated scientific testing. So if you reject miracles on the basis that they cannot be repeated in a systematically testable way in the present, then you would also have to reject recorded history since the same applies. By the way, you would also have to reject particles-to-people evolution since that has never been demonstrated scientifically in the present.
Colin> Please stick to facts and what is probable and possible:
Dr. Lisle: That is exactly my advice to you. Darwinian evolution is neither probable nor possible, so you should reject it if you are going to be rationally consistent. Also, atheism is impossible because it would undermine the preconditions of intelligibility, as I demonstrated above. Therefore, you should reject it, if you want to be rational.
Colin> How to Prove that God Doesn’t Exist | Word on Fire How can the atheist go the full distance and prove theism false?
Dr. Lisle: Answer: they can’t. In order to prove anything whatsoever, you will have to use laws of logic. But laws of logic reflect God’s thinking, which is why they are universal, unchanging, and sovereign over all truth claims. But if atheism were true, there would be no justification for laws of logic, and hence no rational argument could be made.
Colin> Scientific cosmology and gratuitous evil prove atheism
Dr. Lisle: The reverse is true. Science is only possible in the biblical worldview as I demonstrated in the article I referenced above. And the existence of evil presupposes an absolute moral standard that people have the freedom to obey or disobey. But an absolute moral standard is impossible in an atheistic universe where everything is just matter and energy, and people have no genuine freedom if all their actions are predetermined by the chemical reactions acting according to the fixed laws of nature in the brain.
Colin> “How can an infinite and acausal God interact with a finite and causal Universe without a contradiction…Bertrand Russell
Dr. Lisle: Why does Russel think that would be a contradiction? All infinite sets have an infinite number of finite sets embedded within them. Infinity contains the finite; therefore, it is perfectly sensible for an infinite God to interact with a finite creation. If Russell were correct, then mathematical concepts like the Riemann sphere would be impossible, since they map an infinite area to a finite area.
Colin> God explains nothing but the self deluded and Indoctrinated…
Dr. Lisle: I have already shown that to be false – that God is the necessary precondition for the intelligibility of man’s experience and reasoning. So I won’t repeat myself here.
Colin> he no more exists or is needed than a Pink Unicorn!!
Dr. Lisle: I’ve already refuted that. Did you know that it is impossible to prove that God does not exist? You can ask me how if you don’t already know the answer.
Colin> Humans are very good at inventing Gods and Religions…
Dr. Lisle: I agree. As sinful rebels of God, humans would invent almost any silly belief rather than submit to their Creator. Humans even invented the idea that the universe came from nothing, exploding into existence, and life is just an amazing accident! Imagine if someone invoked that idea to explain how automobiles came about – they just sort of happened for no apparent reason. Yet, the universe is far more complex and well-designed than any automobile.
Colin> even the mighty Greeks invented Gods…
Dr. Lisle: Yes. Polytheism, like atheism, is just an absurd belief that people invented because they hate God (Romans 1:18-20).
Colin> that says it all..so please face reality…
Dr. Lisle: I would encourage you to do that. The reality is that science, logic, and morality really are meaningful because the Bible is true. To embrace science, logic, or morality while denying the very God that makes them possible is to deny reality. I encourage you to actually think about this, and not just blindly accept the opinions of atheists on the internet.
Colin> Faith isnt fact but a psychological need or in your case,a bias!
Dr. Lisle: That is certainly true of your faith, but not mine. Faith is confidence in what you have not observed with your senses. And everyone has a type of faith. You have faith in atheism – that is faith because you have not observed with your senses that God doesn’t exist anywhere in the universe (because you haven’t observed the entire universe – only a very tiny spot). The problem with your faith is that it is irrational. It is inconsistent with science, mathematics, logic, morality, and so on for the reasons I mentioned above. So your faith is self-contradictory. I also have faith, but my faith is rationally provable. I also cannot observe with my senses God (because He is normally invisible/non-physical), but I can demonstrate that He exists by the impossibility of the contrary. Namely, the not-God position would make science, logic, and morality utterly meaningless. But these things are not meaningless. Therefore, God.
Colin> Apply Science correctly for truth not Myths!!
Dr. Lisle: I agree! And since evolution is nothing but a myth, and one that would undermine science, we ought to reject it. Science is predicated on the Christian worldview.
Colin> Your evidence for God has now been systematically refuted by better Minds and Scientists in the subjects of Ancient History,Philosophy, Evolutionary Science and Cosmology!
Dr. Lisle: If that’s true, then why haven’t you presented any evidence for this? I would love for you to present actual evidence from ancient history, philosophy, science, and cosmology. But so far, all you have done is make assertions and restate the opinions of others. How does that even remotely constitute evidence. By the way “evolutionary science” is an oxymoron because science is predicated upon biblical creation as I demonstrated above. If evolution were true, there would be no basis for expecting laws of nature, nor of the human brain’s ability to discover them.
Colin> You are not in the intellectual class of these Men:
Dr. Lisle: That is an ad hominem fallacy. Galileo may not have been in the intellectual class of his opponents; but he was still right and they were wrong. And this is known on the basis of evidence, not majority opinion.
Colin> a very hard question for religious people. In this short video Vilayanur Ramachandran describes experiments with split brain patients, people who have had their corpus callosum cut. It is very interes…
Dr. Lisle: I do find such research fascinating, but I’m not sure what that has to do with the topic we are discussing. The design of the brain is truly awesome, and a topic that we are only beginning to understand. But I would think if anything that would argue against your position that the brain is just an accident of nature, and not designed by intelligence.
Colin> Prof Ed Witten FRS..is the world’s most cited and celebrated Theoretical Physicist,alive…he is also an Atheist who supports the words of another Genius,Paul Dirac’s words:”If we are honest — and scientists have to be — we must admit that religion is a jumble of false assertions, with no basis in reality. The very idea of God is a product of the human imagination
Dr. Lisle: It’s an interesting opinion. But I have yet to see any actual evidence or a rational argument that could back it up. Furthermore, his comment that “scientists have to be… honest” presupposes the biblical worldview. It is in the Bible that we read that lying is morally wrong because it is inconsistent with the nature of God. But in an evolutionary worldview, why not lie particularly if it aids survival?
Colin> This is a great interview with cosmologist Alexander Vilenkin, discussing his thoroughly godless theory of the origin of the universe and the necessity of a multiverse.
Dr. Lisle: He’s welcome to his arbitrary opinion, but I see no evidence at all for it. Do you have any evidence for any of your beliefs whatsoever, or do you just blindly accept the opinions of people who you think are smart?
Colin> I’m sorry but you appear like Dr Hugh Ross, a deeply self deluded Man who doesn’t understand reality or Ancient History
Dr. Lisle: That’s okay. It may appear to you that way because you are self-deluded and do not understand reality or ancient history. When you have been deluded for so long, and accustomed to thinking incorrectly, and are suddenly exposed to the truth for the first time, no doubt that truth will appear false to you.
Colin> There is actually no evidence for God or any Religions…
Dr. Lisle: There is no evidence for your religion (atheism / evolution). But all evidence is evidence for the biblical God and the Christian religion because science and logic would be unjustified apart from the Christian worldview. So we can actually prove the biblical worldview by the impossibility of the contrary. This was done in the Bahnsen-Stein debate I mentioned above.
Colin> we have 3000 invented Gods,5000 invented Religions..all man made Myths!
Dr. Lisle: This is the fallacy of the sweeping generalization. Namely, you take as a presupposition that most religions are manmade (I agree with you), and then erroneously conclude that ALL religions are manmade. But that doesn’t follow. 2+2 has an infinite number of wrong answers. But that doesn’t imply that there isn’t one right answer. Yes, atheism is a manmade myth – no doubts there. Christianity is neither myth (because it is based on history), nor is it manmade (because it comes ultimately from God).
Colin> The odds of Christ even existing are less than 50/50 based on modern historical methods!!
Dr. Lisle: Hehe. First of all, I am not aware of any historical scholar whether Christian or secular that denies the existence of Jesus. Perhaps there are some, but they would be few. Christ is simply too-well attested historically. Second, all research methods rely upon logic and science, which are themselves based on the biblical worldview. So if the Bible were not true, there would be no basis for trusting in any research method whatsoever. Third, probability is based on the inductive principle, which cannot be justified apart from the biblical worldview as I demonstrated in the article I linked to above. So whenever you make any kind of probability assessment, you are tacitly relying upon the truth of the Bible.
Colin> No serious Scientists take your evidence seriously
Dr. Lisle: There is a “no true Scotsman” fallacy if ever there was one. As a matter of fact, most of my best friends are Ph.D. scientists who take all evidence very seriously.
Colin>…leading Experts are laughing at you both:
Dr. Lisle: You see Colin, this really shows the reason you hold to atheism/evolutionary ideas. It’s not because of science, evidence, or any rational reasons at all. Rather, you are afraid of being laughed at. But I would rather believe what is true, what is supported by rational argumentation and evidence, and maybe be laughed at, than belief what is false and fit in with the fools of the world.
To be honest, I think the idea that you believe that your great-great-great-great-…-grandfather was a fish is silly and laugh-worthy. Now, I’m not going to mock and laugh at you because it would be rude, and I believe that you deserve dignity and respect because you are made in God’s image. But my point is, no matter what you believe, some people will think it’s silly and laughable. So why not believe what is true, what is supported by rational reasons, rather than just believing what is popular? Ultimately, you will either be laughed at by men, or you will be laughed at by God (Psalm 2:1-4).
Colin> Learn from serious Expert.
Dr. Lisle: All the people I have learned from are experts in their field. I have learned biology from Ph.D. biologists, chemistry from Ph.D. chemists, and most significantly, astrophysics from Ph.D. astrophysicists. And I appreciate them all. But I also have learned to distinguish between evidence and opinions. When an expert gives an opinion, if he or she backs it up with good reasons and evidence, I accept it. I have found that Ph.D. scientists who believe in evolution are not able to provide good evidence for their opinion on that topic (although they may have good reasons for their other beliefs). Conversely, I have found that Ph.D. scientists who believe in biblical creation do have good reasons and evidence for that conviction. Evidence trumps opinions.
Colin> God explains nothing but the self deluded!!
Dr. Lisle: Actually, as I demonstrated above briefly, and in my books and articles in detail, God explains why we have universal, invariant, exceptionless, abstract laws of logic, why humans are able to learn those laws, why humans have basically reliable sensory organs, why the universe has logical patterns, why the human mind is capable of rational choice, why there are laws of nature, etc. Hence the biblical God explains the success of science, logic, and even morality. Atheism cannot justify any of those things. Therefore, atheists who do science are inconsistent; they are relying upon a method that would make no sense given their professed worldview. The Bible also explains why people are so inconsistent, why they delude themselves into denying God while simultaneously accepting those truths that stem from God (see Romans 1:18-25, James 1:16-25). So not only does my worldview account for science, logic, morality, and rationality, but it can also account for why you cling to a worldview that is hopelessly irrational.
Colin> Best Wishes,Colin
Dr. Lisle: Thank you. If you choose to respond, please deal with the actual points I have made and answer the questions I have asked, and provide actual evidence or reasons to back up your assertions, rather than just linking to someone who has an opinion. Opinions, internet links, and youtube videos don’t count in science – only evidence. Best wishes to you as well.
– Dr Jason Lisle