IMO Lennox is one of the better debaters on behalf of Christianity, he doesn't pull too many punches, and he isn't afraid to tell atheists exactly what he thinks of their morality (rather a lack of it) which seems to be rare these days. So many others try to appease and tolerate every politically correct abomination that exists. God bless him!
Morality in the atheists' worldview is merely doing what is fashionable in some culture at some point in history. It doesn't really matter whether they die hugging or mugging. Then again "a fool in his heart says there is no God" Ps19
I love the way John passionately deals with the “god of the gaps” question. Dawkins facetiously says, “We can’t explain it therefore we say God did it” Lennox says, “No, the mere fact that we can, in part, understand it, is what might incline us to say that God did it.” It’s not the lack of understanding the universe and world rather it’s opposite that excites our faith in God as the creator. Love it John Lennox!
Excellent responses from Lennox! He cuts through all the extraneous stuff right to the core problems with a purely naturalistic worldview. Well done, sir!
+Maurice Harting I think he does a very good job of demonstrating the true nature of god. Where there is ignorance in our knowledge that is where you find a place for god. God is ignorance.
170221dn Actually, if you had listened and understood Lennox's remarks, you would not be saying this. He can't help it, though, if you have trouble following complex reasoning.
Jon Hay Only someone who gets sucked in by banality and has difficulty with reason and logic would make a remark like yours. But i think that religion sucks in the ignorant and the gullible alike.
***** Well would you accept that some entity is typing this message to you? That is more evidence for me than there is evidence for your god in the entire world.
There is no known cure for human arrogance, save death. Some are humbled through physical suffering and poverty, some through the majestic beauty and complexity of the creation and others through a dark night of the soul. Some however, will never bow down I fear.
the real motive of atheism is not the search for truth, but rather the human flaw of arrogance of not wanting to comprehend that someone out there is smarter then they are and whom we are accountable too......
The beauty of God is that he doesn't need us to prove his existence. He himself has proven to us that he is real: a fine tuned creation, morality, intelligence, his word.... there is so much evidence! There isn't lack of it, only suppression of it.
John Lennoxs' purpose in lecturing is not to intellectually destroy anyone. He doesn't call anyone idiots either, he states when he believes ideas or arguements are faulty or foolish. You step into the Athiests camp with remarks like this. Remember, as John Lennox does, that the battle is not against flesh & blood but principalities & powers in high places.
Hardly could one find so benign, gentle, decent, humane, candid, well-spoken and respectable a man as John Lennox. To insult such a man, as some of you have clearly attempted below, is disgraceful and inhumane at its least. Learn to be polite and respectful. Show humility and appreciation for the lives of other human beings. Only then can we hope to have a meaningful debate. Peace be upon you all.
+Mavusi Kenpachi Lennox should provide evidence! He is only beating around the bush and tries to REASON his "god" into existence. Just give us cristal clear evidence for all to see and understand. If not, he is simply a thoroughly deluded fool!
Man has to worship at the altar of something sex, power, drugs, money, gambling porn sport self-image etc etc Such is the poverty of a materialistic worldview.
+170221dn Atheists have a lot in common but they don't even recognise the absurdity of their materialistic worldview which demands that mindless matter is the only game in town “People almost invariably arrive at their beliefs not on the basis of proof but on the basis of what they find attractive.” - Blasé Pascal. So what's so attractive about wasting whatever time you have left of your meaningless nanocosmic existence trying to prove atheism has nothing to prove? Such is the absurdity of a worldview so aptly put by atheist philosopher Jean Paul Sartre: “That God does not exist, I cannot deny, That my whole being cries out for God I cannot forget." Without God life has no meaning, no hope and no destiny, so man ends up worshipping himself which was the reason for the FALL -nothing much has changed
Truth Sayer "the absurdity of their materialistic worldview which demands that mindless matter is the only game in town" WRONG. You don't have to have a world view to reject gods. You could reject gods AND reject any and all other worldviews. "Without God life has no meaning" this may be true but it does not make any of our gods true. "which was the reason for the FALL" OMW do you really believe the Adam and Eve story?
"The God of the Bible is also the God of the genome, he can be worshipped in the cathedral and lab" Former atheist turned christian Professor francis collins ph.D geneticist.
It is also common for any intelligent person to misunderstand the basics of Christianity. He did not "take" a life to forgive our sins. He "gave up" His own life to forgive our sins. The difference has eternal consequences.
It is also common for any intelligent person to totally misunderstand Christianity. God did not "Take" a life to forgive our sins. He "Gave" up His own life to forgive our sins. The difference is eternal.
So many atheists havent even examined the evidence against them and automatically assume they are right just because theism sounds implausible. They are the equivalent to bible belt christians who havent ever considered that they might be wrong. Please go and have a good look at some of the evidence to support AND refute the historical reliability of the gospels. I think you will be surprised.
Its delightful in a silly way to actually see his right index finger resume its natural straightness from the perpetual curl that it always seems to be in.
3) The genesis account simply states a set of concepts that were given to moses, likely by way of a vision, that depict approximately the stages of creation. These are by no means 24hr days nor are they necessarily consecutive, infact the cambrien explosion seems to indicate several of the days overlapped and ran congruent with eachother. The genesis account is simply a summary of creation, and infact it is the only religious account that addresses origin with validity.
Questions for the theists: -Did god travel away from earth after he created life or is he still around? -Does god occupy space(atoms/molecules)? If yes how many cubic feet? What is the density? If no then how can a non space occupying agent have power? -Does god watch everything & everyone at once & remembers what everyone does or records each person on a DVD & plays it back later for us on judgement day? -If god had the DVD technology 2000 yrs ago why didn't he put the holly book on DVD?
"What evidence do you have for your god of choice?" The Universe, Complex life forms, fulfilled prophecy, the wisdom in the Bible, secular historians, the parting of the Red sea. Look in to it when you get a chance. The God of the Christians offers everlasting life on earth. Non-believers offer everlasting death.
If atheism is true, how does Darwinism explain altruistic love? The soldier who gives his life for his buddies by jumping on grenade or someone who risk their life to go in a burning building for a baby--someone else's offspring. Darwinism would say the soldier should not sacrifice himself or the rescuer should not rescue the baby and instead let them die to ensure the survival of his own progeny. What is the evolutionary purpose of music?
I want to point out that the discovery of genetics was made by Gregor Mendel, an Augustinian Friar... And that he was rejected in his day by biologists, including Charles Darwin.
What's more fascinating though, is that a mathematician could be this ignorant of why evolutionary processes are biased towards truth representation when they form representations of other things. It is very simple. Assuming that evolution creates somewhat useful, but false, representations of reality, you get a combinatorial explosion of the probability of modules contradicting each other, and thereby resulting in conflicting behaviors in the organism.
The issue is that the Bible is your strongest substantiation or evidence you adduce can be tied to any sort of deity, not just the one you accept as real. Your final segment is an argument from consequence. The attraction of ever-lasting life compared to the relative repulsion of eventual death doesn't speak to the truth of either scenario.
I'm not being facetious as I know Prof. Lennox is one of the greatest modern theologians. But apart from Woody Allen who hinted at it in one of his movies, I have never heard anyone ask if Jesus, who apparently was God incarnate, went to the loo. After all Jesus is reported in the Gospels as having dinners and drinking wine, which he had to digest somehow, right?.
If the universe isn't rationally intelligible, how can science hope to make sense of it? Not presupposing a solution, presupposing results will make sense.
You can choose to disbelieve evolution by natural selection if you want. There will always be people ignorant to the facts and the incredible work of science. If your response to the incredible amount of genetic, anatomical and fossil evidence is "well, that doesn't convince me," then there's really not much for me to add.
Yes the concept of deductive research was introduced by the christian church. It is true the church also caused the dark ages, but that was prior to this. Sir Isaac Newton who i believe to be the greatest scientist who ever lived infact used God to ground his belief that the world is logical, and therefore can be understood logicaly. He is just one figure, but possibly the biggest for this. I also admire him because he never married, as a side note.
Truth OTOH has the property of not leading to contradiction. In such a vast mechanism as the human brain, it's flat out impossible that most of the representations could be faulty. However, again, you don't need to presuppose trust. We value science and out senses because they produce useful results. You can do your best with what you got without insisting that it's true. Certainly making up invisible creatures will not improve the human brain, so theism doesn't improve the situation.
I don't want to take credit for science, I just know that without christians like galileo and Isaac newton science just wouldn't be the same, and yes some of these early scienctists/philosphers thought it was their God given duty to examine the world. John lennox does a much better explanation than I do so just listen to him more. Needham said said that it was religion that halted the development in china, so the reverse can be said about Europe.
It's very clear to me that John Lennox doesn't believe in the supernatural world. His Christianity is one that's very practical and imposes a class system of plebian believers who serve people like him by having a hope in the supernatural. After all, John Lennox doesn't want to have to be the one to sweep the floors or clean the toilets at Oxford - that's left to the religious plebians who don't know any better. I'm starting to see religion serves a very practical purpose.
someone just use very civil language to explain that HE made human with a free mind, that human can have a choice, so someone does evil things too, so do not ask why HE allow evil things. First is his mind, then his language and then his actions. God be mercy on those who did this.
If scientists don't understand quarcks, why do they make theories to explain them? They even use 11 dimentions to explain them. And then by consequence create infinite universes, since it seems the universe is finetuned.
He belives what is reasonable and logical, it makes no difference how long people have believed this to be the case. The so called scientific community were enraged at the idea of the unniverse having a beginning because it sounded too much like the theistic idea, and fought hard to disprove it. They have conceded this unniverse has a beginning but simply move the goal post in saying whatever created the unniverse had no beginning, which is still suspiciously similar to the Biblical narrative.
Really? So I can't lack belief in a god because I haven't been convinced of the existence of one? I can most certainly comprehend that there is someone smarter than me, but the existence of said being would have to be adequately demonstrated or reasonably assumed before I accept its relevance. What evidence do you have for your god of choice?
Hey. Friendly request here. I am thinking I might be an Atheist. I would love for some people on this page to give me some good reasons to believe in Christianity. This is a serious request I am open to hearing anything anyone would like to say, and ask them questions about it. If anyone would like to respond, please do so. Thanks.
Nadir Ex. What gives humans the capability to be self less if we are just naturalistic beings? What survivalistic reason is there to Love and push through this life while being fully aware of the suffering and pain?
Nadir Ex. What gives humans the capability to be self less if we are just naturalistic beings? What survivalistic reason is there to Love and push through this life while being fully aware of the suffering and pain?
Sorry, bit late to the party, but for what it's worth ... Firstly may I say that it is my sincere hope you are an atheist now. About 11 months ago, I started watching atheist vs theist debates. I was pretty much an atheist prior to this but I wasn't sure why. 11 months later and I'm sure now. If I may be so bold as to offer my path to enlightenment in one easy step. Watch a couple of William Lane Craig debates, or maybe just go straight to Sye Ten Bruggencate. The latter's arguments are so egregious that I suspect they have done more to thin the various congregations around the place than any outbreak of rationality ever could.
Id love to see you debate him Tom. And I'd laugh as he reduced you to a sweaty stuttering heap. And then you can go join Dawkins and Hitch in the humiliated heap... Lennox is anointed by God, you are not, and so will always fail...
Where's your proof that Lennox is anointed by God? What about all the other apologists that fail to have a good argument with atheists, are they just not loved or anointed by god enough?
Oh Lennox is by far one of if not the best. He seems to have a very unique way of doing what he does. And yes you can see the anointing on him. And proof you say??? Well you can just see it and hear it in how he delivers what he says. You watch Ravi zacharias or WLC. Theyre good but they just lack what Lennox has..
2) since you will undoubtably ask what my views are, I believe Life was created, I would point to the fossil record as the best evidence of this. The cambrien explosion and statsis in the fossil record to be specific. Our oldest fossils is of bacteria that is about 3.5 billion years old, how long did it take the earth to be capable of holding life? If that is anywhere near a billion years that means life started almost as soon as it could.
1:he is still around 2: no he occupies no space, he is spaceless thats one of his neccesary features... the teory is that he created space and time and therfore has to be outside of both space and time thus space less and infinite in the past. how can he have power? how do atoms push each other whitout being in contakt?, 3: he can se everything at once and then he remembers everything, i dont get where your going whit that tho 4:he did not even wright the bible. we did, we also created the dvd
- The Bible says he's still around, but the way you ask the question somehow has a physical body which has to physically move around. This is false. - We don't know. The fact that we don't know, doesn't prove anything, the same way science don't know how universe and life works, or even how quarks work, doesn't disprove science. - Yes. DVD.Why not Bluray? Or something from year 5000? Anyways, what happened to the understanding of the word: Almighty. - They didn't have any DVD-players, of course.
Gerry De naro "I think only an idiot can be an atheist. We must admit that there is a great power or force of unlimited intelligence in our universe with a devine spark that got it all started in the first place" Christian anfinsen, Biochemist and nobel laureate winner.
***** no you won't. God, nor i nor anyone else can help you, the willfully ignorant. Here's one reason though... why is there something rather than nothing, you can't look at this universe and all life and think it came from an explosion. That's unreasonable.
GamerDares Wins "God, nor i nor anyone else can help you, the willfully ignorant." ~ God can't help me? way to limit his/her/it's omnipotence. Furthermore that means absolutely nothing as you have not shown that I am in fact willfully ignorant, I could say the same thing back to you in relation to you not wanting to let go of your imaginary friend but that doesn't mean I've demonstrated anything. "Here's one reason though... why is there something rather than nothing" ~ Great question! I have no idea but I wish I did know. Do you know? "you can't look at this universe and all life and think it came from an explosion." ~ I don't, but I guess what you're are attempting to refer to is the cosmic event known as the big bang? That wasn't an explosion per say but rather an expansion from a singularity, this event has lots of evidence going for it, to name some: cosmic microwave background radiation, the "red-shift", basically what we do know is that a "big-bang" event did happen, what we don't know is the cause or explanation as to why it happened, again I wish I knew but I won't make up fake answers that have no evidence for them at all as this would be an appeal to ignorance fallacy.
Actually the church was the first to try and side with galileo, but after his fellow astronomers refused to look through the telescope so to speak, they then persecuted him. Also yes, we wouldn't have the scientific community if not for christianity, why do you think no such similar endeavor appeared in china when they were just as intelligent and capable of serious study. That kind of think didn't occur in the asian countries until the last century or so.
You may well be right that some scientists felt that their belief in God helped them and motivated them, and I couldn't deny that. But so what? Other scientists have been motivated by belief in Buddha, or by getting their name in papers and seeking fame, and all sorts of other things. Doesn't say much about Christianity's essential role in science, does it?
"Superstitions like he does". JL beliefs are based on the evidence supporting Christianity. It's improbable for a man of his intellect to have subjective beliefs. What kind of information could you provide to JL, to point him to a different direction?
yep kids its that time athiesm is the new religion on the block. followed with just as much fervor as those who perpetrated the Spanish inquisition. they will march relentlessly to crush and ridicule others beliefs.
The evolution distinction he makes seems to be a red herring. Evolution accounts for the diversity and existence of species, and is so parsimonious and well researched that it can hardly be falsified by the question of how life got going in the first place. Origin of life research is a field within its-self.
Christians believe this : That the word became flesh in the person of Jesus Christ - Therefore man can come to know God through knowing Jesus Christ. So u can not say u can not come to know him - your opportunity is to know Christ - No different how former atheists who are not stupid such as C.S Lewis came to faith. U can U tube - Phd comes to Christ or Dr Rosaria Butterfield or Dr Holly Ordway Phd. The answers u r looking for will never satisfy u its only through knowing (not gances at) Christ.
It's just silly to say that you need to presuppose that the universe is rationally intelligible to do science. It merely has to actually be the case that it *is* intelligible for science to be able to produce results. No scientist "presupposes" that he will find a solution when he starts an investigation. He tries to find out what's going on and build a model that has predictive power. You can tell that Lennox is a mathematician/philosopher and not a scientist who's ever investigated anything.
Lennox is intellectually sufficient but his argument can go as far as the truth of his premise ....in other words 2+2 is not 5 even if Einstein said it poetically!!!!
CREATION PROVES THERE MUST BE AN UNCAUSED, IMMATERIAL, 1st CAUSE and hence a gifted masterful, all -powerful CREATOR PREMISE: Since a state of the physical world exists now, (be it quarks, black holes, Big Bangs or singularities, past & present universes,) there are only two plausible explanations: EITHER a) Matter in some form has existed eternally in the past or b) It was created by an external agent along with all time and space That infinite past time is impossible is demonstrated thus: 1).The state of our present finite universe, (S1) exists because a previous state (S2) existed. 2). S2 exists because S3 existed as it did b/c S4 preceded it. 4) This can be summed up in the formula: Sn exists b/c state Sn+1 pre-existed it 5). As the state required for the existence of our present universe can never be reached from an infinite regress of past states, our universe cannot exist. 6) Our universe does exist. 7). Therefore, infinite past cannot be true. Infinite past time is a logical absurdity. Since past time is finite and the physical realm exists in time, matter had to have been created by an atemporal, non-contingent immaterial uncaused cause - G O D Next - so what about God's nature? An infinite past is an hypothetical point that can never be reached, for there is always one more event, unit of time or space before you get there. Only math sets like n(n+1) or the series 1,2,3, ~ to infinity are actual infinities. An infinite future however, is a virtual infinity since it is not yet realized, that is, it has not yet come into existence. An infinite past, on the other hand, is an entirely different matter. While an infinite past, like an infinite future, can never be reached, it is impossible because an event in an infinite past requires an infinite amount of time for its effects to reach the present, and an infinite amount of time is an amount of time that can never be realized. Think of a star existing an infinite distance away. Could its light ever reach us? Of course not. Therefore, a present time dependant upon events which happened in an infinite past simply cannot exist, nor can they ever exist, for in order for them to exist an infinite amount of time must first pass. Ergo, to propose a universe which has an infinite past is to propose a universe which cannot exist. Ergo, because we know the universe does indeed exist, we also know the universe does not have an infinite past.
Nothing in the Universe suggest a creator, on the contrary the more we discover as humans about the nature of the cosmos the more clearer it gets that we don't require a creator to account for anything. Something always existed this is certain. That something thought if far more plausible being something "simple" than extremely complicated. In other words is extremely more plausible an underline code or structure essence always existed than a complex person with consciousness and eternal qualities. Consciousness, intelligence comes late on Evolution and requires environment not at the beginning. Infinite past is irrelevant because time begins with our UNVRS. You demonstrate good logic but its completely outdated. This argument could pass 2000 years ago in ancient Greece not in the quantum and relativity age.
Robby Bobby Actually the truth is exactly the opposite of what you say. You believe without any reason because is in human nature......You are driven by sentiment. I believe comforting to reason and evidence......I am doing the difficult stuff you are just riding the river of your nature. And believe is not a choice. Nether science nether reality .......AND CERTAINLY nether archaeology and history proves the existence of God. You dare say archaeology !! Even the Israel country had to admit that there is not a single evidence found supporting the biblical accounts in expense of their tourism.
Robby Bobby Everything is bigger than God because God doesn't exist. You say "why would anyone deny the " the easy and comfortable life ".......Because some of us are too intelligent to believe Hebrew immoral superstitious nonsense on no evidence. As i told you believe is not a choice !! Ether you believe ether not. And by the way i don't see comfort being a subject to monster ho supposedly made places like Hell and sacrifice his son ...For some lesson ......I am better than that.
Robby Bobby What part of "i don't believe God exist" do you not get !! Do you seriously think that i believe God exist .....But i rather go to hell on stubbornness. How can be angry to something i don't believe it exist. And given your arrogance not excepting my opinion i guess you have many evidence for your God ....Lets hear one!! Right and wrong are related to thing that work in a given environment ......Bad and Good is related to our human wellbeing.
Kostas Spiliotopoulos You forgot to give me any evidence for your God .......Your argument so far is ......You are angry because you don't agree with me. Its obvious that the reason you believe is on feelings.....Thats way you use words like anger, spoiled .....How about give some real evidence.
human intellect has gotten us to a point where we believe we can explain everything both scientifically and relegiously. i think the fundamental issue here is wheather the entity we have chosen to describe as God, that has come to being as a result of our gradual acknowlegdement of the splender of the universe and our inability to explain some of the questions it poses to us really requires the favour and advocacy of our species for its workings to continue running smoothly as the organised religious groups would like to have it. Or does this entity we call God need permission from the the scientific community's administrative department to continue creating these marveles we see all arround us.. human construts such as organised religion have reduced God to something that should be feared and done favours for as if it really needs that to fuel its existance...lets continue our quest for scientific and philosophical enlighentment but at the same time lets not be naiive enough to think that just because we've posses the right amount of brain powere then we can meassure in a laboratory the true scale of God.. P.S i also think the Fact that we call this entity God comes with conotations that tend to spark opposing ideas about it hence the scince vs religion contention..bottom line is that there must have been some something that got the ball rolling and our significance in the bigger scheme of things is more minute than we can ever start to imagine...
A sceptic may be briefly swayed by a theologian but his point is soon lost when the hardened skeptic is plunged back into his physical world of material indulgence. What’s needed is to undermine atheism’s faith in naturalism & all its materialistic assumptions is showing they are not supported by modern science. He wont be swayed by books on theology but the BEST scientists who draws theistic conclusions, will trouble him deeply.” (C.S Lewis) “The chief aim of all investigations of the external world should be to discover the rational order and harmony which has been imposed on it by its Creator and which He revealed to us in the language of advanced mathematics.” -Johannes Kepler Sir Lawrence Bragg, Nobel Prize in physics: “Science and religion are apposed , just as the fingers and thumb are apposed, so that between them we may grasp everything. Roger Penrose on chance Vs fine-tuning!. “The conditions of the BB were so special that the probability that they came about by chance are 1x 10^123 power. "There has got to be incredible FINETUNING in the initial organization of the universe" See /evotionarynewsDOTorg. Taking into account all the other parameters, many scientists have come to espouse "The Anthropic Principle," which contends that the universe was brought into existence intentionally for the sake of producing mankind-a PURPOSE! Want 100s more google "if you think science leads to atheism."
one can neither put into context nor perspective that which his mind is not designed to understand, same way humans can not digest cellulose due to our physiological design...
*billion* not billions. That's 1 billion years at most. That also assumes life didnt exist before the fossil, and that the earth was even capable of maintaining life since it was first made. Given that, and the massive improbablity of it, I think I am certainly justified in at least not believing it could come about by any undirected process materialist scientists postulate. Perhaps that doesn't prove design, but it certainly means I have grounds to say it was designed.
Questions for atheists" -Do you believe that raping and torturing children is bad? Because if you do then you must believe that the reason you hold that view is simply down to random chance and time and not for any other reason. -Do you reject the gospels because of their content before you have considered their historical reliability? And if not, why are they unreliable documents? -Why do you care about other people believing in God if you know He doesn't exist?
Easy. I believe these things are wrong because they are demknstrably bad for society and harmful for everyone. and therefore we ought not do it. I dont believe in objective morality though, and I dont think you can prove it exists. I reject the bible because of the ignorant and violent doctrines it promotes and the self-contradictory propositions throughout. An omniscient god could also have surely cleared up the confusion about slavery and other doctrines disagreed upon by honest truth seeking christians and non christians. I care about people believing in god because it halts science. It is divisive. It inspires violence and hatred. Personally i can not come out atheist to my family or i will be cast out. I can not be myself because christianity teaches people to be unsatisfied with letting people be non-christian. Christianity also informs oppressive political policies and starts wars and gives people excuses to do things like murder homosexuals, own slaves, and bomb abortion clinics. We know better. And this doubles as a rebuttal against your biblical morality.
@@freethoughtgreg6424 If you read the bible carefully, I think you'd see that there is a lot of kindness and love in the bible and the danger of hatred especially. Hatred seems to come from misunderstanding and refusing things that radically divert from ones own views both for good and bad. You could say that the advancements of science and the devaluing of nature are evil because of the amount of damage done to the environment and to each other. Not all progress can be seen as good considering how society only considers itself and then really focuses on environmental issues when it gets REALLY bad. I myself believe in God but accept Science and many heads in science do believe or have believed in God.
Atheist live in a FICTION WORLD, while 99.9 percent of the world lives in a FACT WORLD, those who understand God is real. So how can one argue or debate with people who live in a fiction world? No chance of making them see, any sense to their lives. 90 percent of them, sadly, die in despair.
One example: all other religious books, place the existance ot their god(s) within spacetime of our universe. The bible places God out of our spacetime. There other things that are importantly different in the bible versus other religious books. eg The beginning of life, the physical form and situation of the earth in the universe, etc. etc No other religious book comes near the scientificaly correctness even the bible isn·t a scientific book.
2: Time to study up. "Because they have mass" is simply wrong. It's very clear that you don't grasp the whole concept of "God", which is why you ask all these questions. The only relevant question you've asked, is "How do you know God is still around?", all the others are questions you will never get answers you can be pleased with, simply because God is way more advanced than we can ever imagine. We can't simply answer what he consist of, and explain his every thought. If we could, we'd be God.
THEY say it is severely improbably, I'm jus using their words. Yes that does give me reason to believe Life was designed, even if it wasn't designed by god, the implications are still there. You also make the mistake of thinking this in someway is even central to my arguement. Just because God would explain this doesn't mean its any foundational belief, infact this evidence just reinforces what I already expected. IF you think we will one day discover how life started, that's science of the gaps
Wait a minute... so we don't have a full understanding of the beginning of life... therefore that implies life was designed? Or, therefore that gives you reason to believe life was designed? What on EARTH are you talking about? I personally think that science will have a more complete picture of the beginning of life, but that's just an opinion, and I don't base my worldview on it. I'm quite content to say that we just don't have a detailed understanding of the beginning of life.
Don't be rediculous that isn't at all my arguements. Anyways enjoy your "materialism of the gaps". Give me that ol' time evolution, that's good enough for me.
In such a vast mechanism as the human brain it is statistically impossible that any representation controlled by random occurrence could be correct. There is only one correct answer to 2+2, and there are an infinite number of wrong answers. There is only one correct theory that explains how plants convert sunlight to energy and there are potentially an infinite number of theories that incorrectly explain this process. On a side note the camera man should be shot.
Yes, and then scientists in the coming centuries realized that you don't need to ground logic in God. It's quite a desperate attempt on your part to claim that science is somehow indebted to Christianity. Just think about what you're saying: Kepler and Galileo faced incredible persecution for sharing their scientific ideas with the religious world. Science doesn't need Christianity.
“Science depends on an assumption of the rational intelligibility of the universe” ???? I’m no scientist but that is twaddle. Science is just pigging around with stuff to see what happens. What happens just happens, and we learn a bit about the stuff. Twaddle twiddle twaddle. And don’t no one mention free will ffs.
There are lots of evidence for religions and those evidence prove that religions existed. But the evidence that religions existed or the evidence that religion has presented does not prove god exists. Lennox may talk all he wants but at the end of the day he has got no proof. He says ridiculous thing like "god sent his son to earth". This proves being expert in mathematics or other sciences does not exclude one to be delusional.
Lol as if science is actively trying to fight religion. Most scientists (myself included) don't even think about superstitious shit when we're at the lab (or the office). It's a waste of time!
Mathematical developments and technological developments are not the same as science. True the greeks had logical inquiry but how much did they discover about the world? Next to nothing, nor china nor india, nearly all modern science stems from Europe, and what was the biggest contributer to European development? Religion, more specificaly some form of christianity. I made up nothing, the greeks had philosophy I'll give you that, but the dedicated testing and observing methods come from Europe.
2) this is also nothing to do with the bigger issue you raised about "creationism". I've pointed out the evidence of evolution is trivial at best, and I say this without theological grounds, but evidentiary grounds. And you retorted with a strawman about me believing in somehting contrary to science, namely the earth's age. I explained to you very clearly what the Bible actually says, and this in no way contradicts what are best guesses about history before humans was.
It's not as if God's relevance has been rationally demonstrated and I am simply being willfully ignorant. This isn't an issue of free will to accept or reject an offer like choosing among ice cream flavors at a shop. For me to genuinely accept the offer, my conscience would have to be convinced of truth value behind the God claim. That aside, an excuse from being judged for lack of belief is a petty issue. Why should God even bother judging me on this matter? Sounds childish and vindictive.
I don't know where they came up with that "god of the gaps" nonsense and no scientist clearly understand everything/anything so I don't know what the garbage is about.
My OpenMind Because he goes against your worldview? He's telling the truth. Atheism holds the creationist worldview to a standard that itself can't stand up to
Untrue. I don't claim to know, atheism doesn't make any claims. Lennox is lying when he claims that he does and that a theistic god is a meaningful explanation. I'm not even sure he actually believe what he spins.
+My OpenMind Open your mind dear fellow . We are all faced with the same questions Either God exists or he doesn't either theism is true or materialism is true either mind came from matter or matter came from mind either ultimate reality is transcendent or mindless matter is the only game in town. either Creation is true or time/matter/energy is eternal in the past either the universe has an uncaused cause or it popped into existence out of nothing either the universe is a lawless, lifeless chaos or it is fine-tuned by design either our fine-tuned, rationally intelligible universe came about by sheer chance or a rationally intelligent cause. either the ABSTRACT laws of science, logic and math exist only in a physical brain or in the abstract mind of their Creator who defined this awe-inspiring world into existence. either nature is endowed with these laws, or all physical processes including abiogenesis & evolution were the product of blind forces, unguided processes and chance. Either something is right even if nobody is right or it is always wrong even if everybody is wrong? Either life has meaning, hope and destiny or we're just a bunch of selfish genes with no purpose, no hope and no escape. either morality is merely a spinoff & by-product of socio-biological evolution or a Moral Law Giver Either we're all biological machines in motion or have an eternal soul, either we’re spiritual beings having a brief physical experience or “a bunch of selfish genes fighting for survival in a world of pitiless indifference” either we're just future worm fodder or part of God's providential plan. Which worldview then, offers a deep sense of joy, meaning hope and destiny?
Nothing new in the claims you make. Ill believe it when you provide some evidence. In the meantime lets explore the unknown with an open mind and not make claims about clearly manmade deities, the universe and then pretend that these things are facts. Why does religion feel the need to claim to have the knowledge it doesn't? when the appeal to certainty? There is evidence for evolution. The afterglow of the big bang has been observed. We can hypothesise about cosmic origins ( arxiv.org/pdf/hep-th/0702178.pdf ) and test those theories. Can you name one instance where there was a disagreement between religion and science where when the matter was settles the correct answer turned out to be the religious one?
My OpenMind Yes, I could name numerous instances of science having been proven wrong, where "religion" had it right all along. But, you are confusing religion with theology.....not the same thing.
Ian M read his discussion on literalism or watch seven days that divide the world....otherwise have the guts to join an academic discussion....instead of trying to make a highly intelligent man look like a fool
***** Speaking in science can solve all your problem and have all the answer that is really brilliant indeed. Believe in North Korea leader (Kim Jong Un), Castro and also many others as well such as those prostitutes, prisoners, drug addicts etc who they are brilliant guys simply bec. they don't believe in God. People believe in God can not be intelligent or brilliant. I will put you in the same categories as those not believing in God, that is truly brilliant and admire you guys.
I'm not sure why you are so ignorant about these issues when all you have to do is do a quick google search. The first forms of life as we recognize it today are thought to have appeared about 1 billion years after the formation of the earth. That's a long time.
The only thing that makes sence to me is the word crap. All the other things are are highly blownup retoric without any added value. TRhe crap I understand,; its the same crap you use to crithesice(sic) the bible and God, but wich you want here about if it is used in favor of the bible or to debunk statements of you over the bible that are clearly false. The bible gives thents of scientific statements were a lot of are just descovered in the last hounderd years, some even shorter. B.L.N.T. :D
I'm binge watching every Lennox video I can find, his debates against Hitchens and Dawkins are Gold.💛
❤✝️🙏✝️⚓✝️
Thank you dearest Dr. Lennox. You are as fine a humble servant as I have ever seen. 🙏🏼
IMO Lennox is one of the better debaters on behalf of Christianity, he doesn't pull too many punches, and he isn't afraid to tell atheists exactly what he thinks of their morality (rather a lack of it) which seems to be rare these days. So many others try to appease and tolerate every politically correct abomination that exists.
God bless him!
God? What's that?
Atheists have no morality.
They seem to think "being good" cuts it, Ha!
willzer808 creator of universe? Yaweh? Spoke of quite prominently in the Bible?
You may of heard of him?
GamerDares Wins Nope, never heard of him. I've never been a fan of fiction though, so I skipped that and the rest of the Star Trek series.
Morality in the atheists' worldview is merely doing what is fashionable in some culture at some point in history. It doesn't really matter whether they die hugging or mugging. Then again "a fool in his heart says there is no God" Ps19
I love the way John passionately deals with the “god of the gaps” question.
Dawkins facetiously says, “We can’t explain it therefore we say God did it”
Lennox says, “No, the mere fact that we can, in part, understand it, is what might incline us to say that God did it.”
It’s not the lack of understanding the universe and world rather it’s opposite that excites our faith in God as the creator.
Love it John Lennox!
Excellent responses from Lennox! He cuts through all the extraneous stuff right to the core problems with a purely naturalistic worldview. Well done, sir!
+Maurice Harting
I think he does a very good job of demonstrating the true nature of god. Where there is ignorance in our knowledge that is where you find a place for god. God is ignorance.
170221dn Actually, if you had listened and understood Lennox's remarks, you would not be saying this. He can't help it, though, if you have trouble following complex reasoning.
Jon Hay
Only someone who gets sucked in by banality and has difficulty with reason and logic would make a remark like yours. But i think that religion sucks in the ignorant and the gullible alike.
*****
So you tell me I have to believe in a god for which there is absolutely N O evidence and then question my identity. Delusion!!
*****
Well would you accept that some entity is typing this message to you? That is more evidence for me than there is evidence for your god in the entire world.
There is no known cure for human arrogance, save death. Some are humbled through physical suffering and poverty, some through the majestic beauty and complexity of the creation and others through a dark night of the soul. Some however, will never bow down I fear.
the real motive of atheism is not the search for truth, but rather the human flaw of arrogance of not wanting to comprehend that someone out there is smarter then they are and whom we are accountable too......
He is beyond fantastic. Good on him!
The beauty of God is that he doesn't need us to prove his existence. He himself has proven to us that he is real: a fine tuned creation, morality, intelligence, his word.... there is so much evidence! There isn't lack of it, only suppression of it.
"Christianity is reasonable"
C.S. lewis
Former atheist turned christian oxford scholar
John Lennoxs' purpose in lecturing is not to intellectually destroy anyone. He doesn't call anyone idiots either, he states when he believes ideas or arguements are faulty or foolish. You step into the Athiests camp with remarks like this. Remember, as John Lennox does, that the battle is not against flesh & blood but principalities & powers in high places.
Thank God for John Lennox!
Hardly could one find so benign, gentle, decent, humane, candid, well-spoken and respectable a man as John Lennox. To insult such a man, as some of you have clearly attempted below, is disgraceful and inhumane at its least. Learn to be polite and respectful. Show humility and appreciation for the lives of other human beings. Only then can we hope to have a meaningful debate. Peace be upon you all.
Great stuff very educating.
Christandom is owe to you sir, for your deep wisdom and dedication
Unfounded utter NONSENSE! That's all there is to Lennox!
+Mavusi Kenpachi Lennox should provide evidence! He is only beating around the bush and tries to REASON his "god" into existence. Just give us cristal clear evidence for all to see and understand. If not, he is simply a thoroughly deluded fool!
Hi Geo! And who should know better than you!
Atheists replaced God worship with ego worship.
Man has to worship at the altar of something sex, power, drugs, money, gambling porn sport self-image etc etc Such is the poverty of a materialistic worldview.
Gerry De naro And those are some of the real reasons why many atheists reject God. It has nothing to do with evidence but self indulgence.
+Ricky909
"Atheists replaced God worship with ego worship."
Actually the only thing they have in common is reject god myths.
+170221dn Atheists have a lot in common but they don't even recognise the absurdity of their materialistic worldview which demands that mindless matter is the only game in town
“People almost invariably arrive at their beliefs not on the basis of proof but on the basis of what they find attractive.” - Blasé Pascal. So what's so attractive about wasting whatever time you have left of your meaningless nanocosmic existence trying to prove atheism has nothing to prove? Such is the absurdity of a worldview so aptly put by atheist philosopher Jean Paul Sartre: “That God does not exist, I cannot deny, That my whole being cries out for God I cannot forget." Without God life has no meaning, no hope and no destiny, so man ends up worshipping himself which was the reason for the FALL -nothing much has changed
Truth Sayer
"the absurdity of their materialistic worldview which demands that mindless matter is the only game in town"
WRONG.
You don't have to have a world view to reject gods. You could reject gods AND reject any and all other worldviews.
"Without God life has no meaning"
this may be true but it does not make any of our gods true.
"which was the reason for the FALL"
OMW do you really believe the Adam and Eve story?
God gives us free will to check the level of our FAITH in Him, "Blessed are they, who do not see, yet believe".
"The God of the Bible is also the God of the genome, he can be worshipped in the cathedral and lab"
Former atheist turned christian Professor francis collins ph.D geneticist.
Waterfalls=God!!! Lol francis collins... give me a break
It is also common for any intelligent person to misunderstand the basics of Christianity. He did not "take" a life to forgive our sins. He "gave up" His own life to forgive our sins. The difference has eternal consequences.
It is also common for any intelligent person to totally misunderstand Christianity. God did not "Take" a life to forgive our sins. He "Gave" up His own life to forgive our sins. The difference is eternal.
Watching in 2024.👍🏼
So many atheists havent even examined the evidence against them and automatically assume they are right just because theism sounds implausible. They are the equivalent to bible belt christians who havent ever considered that they might be wrong.
Please go and have a good look at some of the evidence to support AND refute the historical reliability of the gospels. I think you will be surprised.
yeah
Thank you John......
Its delightful in a silly way to actually see his right index finger resume its natural straightness from the perpetual curl that it always seems to be in.
3) The genesis account simply states a set of concepts that were given to moses, likely by way of a vision, that depict approximately the stages of creation. These are by no means 24hr days nor are they necessarily consecutive, infact the cambrien explosion seems to indicate several of the days overlapped and ran congruent with eachother. The genesis account is simply a summary of creation, and infact it is the only religious account that addresses origin with validity.
Questions for the theists:
-Did god travel away from earth after he created life or is he still around?
-Does god occupy space(atoms/molecules)? If yes how many cubic feet? What is the density? If no then how can a non space occupying agent have power?
-Does god watch everything & everyone at once & remembers what everyone does or records each person on a DVD & plays it back later for us on judgement day?
-If god had the DVD technology 2000 yrs ago why didn't he put the holly book on DVD?
"What evidence do you have for your god of choice?"
The Universe, Complex life forms, fulfilled prophecy, the wisdom in the Bible, secular historians, the parting of the Red sea. Look in to it when you get a chance. The God of the Christians offers everlasting life on earth. Non-believers offer everlasting death.
If atheism is true, how does Darwinism explain altruistic love? The soldier who gives his life for his buddies by jumping on grenade or someone who risk their life to go in a burning building for a baby--someone else's offspring. Darwinism would say the soldier should not sacrifice himself or the rescuer should not rescue the baby and instead let them die to ensure the survival of his own progeny. What is the evolutionary purpose of music?
& I really enjoy it!
Yes i know, he uses politeness and elegance to tear his opponent to shreds ;D
Thank you! ; )
I want to point out that the discovery of genetics was made by Gregor Mendel, an Augustinian Friar... And that he was rejected in his day by biologists, including Charles Darwin.
What's more fascinating though, is that a mathematician could be this ignorant of why evolutionary processes are biased towards truth representation when they form representations of other things. It is very simple. Assuming that evolution creates somewhat useful, but false, representations of reality, you get a combinatorial explosion of the probability of modules contradicting each other, and thereby resulting in conflicting behaviors in the organism.
The issue is that the Bible is your strongest substantiation or evidence you adduce can be tied to any sort of deity, not just the one you accept as real. Your final segment is an argument from consequence. The attraction of ever-lasting life compared to the relative repulsion of eventual death doesn't speak to the truth of either scenario.
I'm not being facetious as I know Prof. Lennox is one of the greatest modern theologians. But apart from Woody Allen who hinted at it in one of his movies, I have never heard anyone ask if Jesus, who apparently was God incarnate, went to the loo. After all Jesus is reported in the Gospels as having dinners and drinking wine, which he had to digest somehow, right?.
If the universe isn't rationally intelligible, how can science hope to make sense of it?
Not presupposing a solution, presupposing results will make sense.
You can choose to disbelieve evolution by natural selection if you want. There will always be people ignorant to the facts and the incredible work of science. If your response to the incredible amount of genetic, anatomical and fossil evidence is "well, that doesn't convince me," then there's really not much for me to add.
Yes the concept of deductive research was introduced by the christian church. It is true the church also caused the dark ages, but that was prior to this. Sir Isaac Newton who i believe to be the greatest scientist who ever lived infact used God to ground his belief that the world is logical, and therefore can be understood logicaly. He is just one figure, but possibly the biggest for this. I also admire him because he never married, as a side note.
Out of all the objections you could have, you pick these ones?
Truth OTOH has the property of not leading to contradiction. In such a vast mechanism as the human brain, it's flat out impossible that most of the representations could be faulty.
However, again, you don't need to presuppose trust. We value science and out senses because they produce useful results. You can do your best with what you got without insisting that it's true. Certainly making up invisible creatures will not improve the human brain, so theism doesn't improve the situation.
I don't want to take credit for science, I just know that without christians like galileo and Isaac newton science just wouldn't be the same, and yes some of these early scienctists/philosphers thought it was their God given duty to examine the world. John lennox does a much better explanation than I do so just listen to him more. Needham said said that it was religion that halted the development in china, so the reverse can be said about Europe.
mam you are awesome!!
It's very clear to me that John Lennox doesn't believe in the supernatural world. His Christianity is one that's very practical and imposes a class system of plebian believers who serve people like him by having a hope in the supernatural. After all, John Lennox doesn't want to have to be the one to sweep the floors or clean the toilets at Oxford - that's left to the religious plebians who don't know any better. I'm starting to see religion serves a very practical purpose.
Lennox took Dawkins to the rack in this video!
someone just use very civil language to explain that HE made human with a free mind, that human can have a choice, so someone does evil things too, so do not ask why HE allow evil things. First is his mind, then his language and then his actions. God be mercy on those who did this.
Let me just comment about the camera work. Use two cameras. If you are going to use one, put it on a tripod and leave it alone.. :)
So now is the easy part....You have to present them!!!...OUPS
If scientists don't understand quarcks, why do they make theories to explain them? They even use 11 dimentions to explain them. And then by consequence create infinite universes, since it seems the universe is finetuned.
He belives what is reasonable and logical, it makes no difference how long people have believed this to be the case. The so called scientific community were enraged at the idea of the unniverse having a beginning because it sounded too much like the theistic idea, and fought hard to disprove it. They have conceded this unniverse has a beginning but simply move the goal post in saying whatever created the unniverse had no beginning, which is still suspiciously similar to the Biblical narrative.
Really? So I can't lack belief in a god because I haven't been convinced of the existence of one? I can most certainly comprehend that there is someone smarter than me, but the existence of said being would have to be adequately demonstrated or reasonably assumed before I accept its relevance. What evidence do you have for your god of choice?
Hey. Friendly request here. I am thinking I might be an Atheist. I would love for some people on this page to give me some good reasons to believe in Christianity. This is a serious request I am open to hearing anything anyone would like to say, and ask them questions about it. If anyone would like to respond, please do so. Thanks.
Nadir Ex. What gives humans the capability to be self less if we are just naturalistic beings? What survivalistic reason is there to Love and push through this life while being fully aware of the suffering and pain?
Nadir Ex. What gives humans the capability to be self less if we are just naturalistic beings? What survivalistic reason is there to Love and push through this life while being fully aware of the suffering and pain?
Sorry, bit late to the party, but for what it's worth ...
Firstly may I say that it is my sincere hope you are an atheist now. About 11 months ago, I started watching atheist vs theist debates. I was pretty much an atheist prior to this but I wasn't sure why. 11 months later and I'm sure now.
If I may be so bold as to offer my path to enlightenment in one easy step.
Watch a couple of William Lane Craig debates, or maybe just go straight to Sye Ten Bruggencate. The latter's arguments are so egregious that I suspect they have done more to thin the various congregations around the place than any outbreak of rationality ever could.
Nadir Ex
Give “Mere Christianity” by C.S.Lewis a read. 😉👌🏼👍🏼🙏🏼
I didn't say I believe abiogenesis -- in fact, I don't. I think it's possible though.
Pardon me, stanely miller, not Kennit miller.
Id love to see you debate him Tom.
And I'd laugh as he reduced you to a sweaty stuttering heap.
And then you can go join Dawkins and Hitch in the humiliated heap...
Lennox is anointed by God, you are not, and so will always fail...
Where's your proof that Lennox is anointed by God? What about all the other apologists that fail to have a good argument with atheists, are they just not loved or anointed by god enough?
Oh Lennox is by far one of if not the best.
He seems to have a very unique way of doing what he does.
And yes you can see the anointing on him.
And proof you say???
Well you can just see it and hear it in how he delivers what he says.
You watch Ravi zacharias or WLC.
Theyre good but they just lack what Lennox has..
Steven Pounsett Are you god? or did god just tell you this?
Am I God??? Haha ummm no.
Well not quite, he didn't tell me but when you yourself feel Gods anointing then you can pick it quite easily.
2) since you will undoubtably ask what my views are, I believe Life was created, I would point to the fossil record as the best evidence of this. The cambrien explosion and statsis in the fossil record to be specific. Our oldest fossils is of bacteria that is about 3.5 billion years old, how long did it take the earth to be capable of holding life? If that is anywhere near a billion years that means life started almost as soon as it could.
1:he is still around
2: no he occupies no space, he is spaceless thats one of his neccesary features... the teory is that he created space and time and therfore has to be outside of both space and time thus space less and infinite in the past. how can he have power? how do atoms push each other whitout being in contakt?,
3: he can se everything at once and then he remembers everything, i dont get where your going whit that tho
4:he did not even wright the bible. we did, we also created the dvd
- The Bible says he's still around, but the way you ask the question somehow has a physical body which has to physically move around. This is false.
- We don't know. The fact that we don't know, doesn't prove anything, the same way science don't know how universe and life works, or even how quarks work, doesn't disprove science.
- Yes. DVD.Why not Bluray? Or something from year 5000? Anyways, what happened to the understanding of the word: Almighty.
- They didn't have any DVD-players, of course.
THERE IS EVIDENCE AND GOD IS REAL
"Strangely enough science does more to prove God than religion ever could"
Physicist and self confessed agnostic Paul davies.
Yes, google "if you think science leads to atheism"
Gerry De naro "I think only an idiot can be an atheist.
We must admit that there is a great power or force of unlimited intelligence in our universe with a devine spark that got it all started in the first place"
Christian anfinsen, Biochemist and nobel laureate winner.
GamerDares Wins Ok great I will believe in a deity as soon as you (or anyone) gives me any reason to
***** no you won't.
God, nor i nor anyone else can help you, the willfully ignorant.
Here's one reason though... why is there something rather than nothing, you can't look at this universe and all life and think it came from an explosion.
That's unreasonable.
GamerDares Wins "God, nor i nor anyone else can help you, the willfully ignorant."
~ God can't help me? way to limit his/her/it's omnipotence. Furthermore that means absolutely nothing as you have not shown that I am in fact willfully ignorant, I could say the same thing back to you in relation to you not wanting to let go of your imaginary friend but that doesn't mean I've demonstrated anything.
"Here's one reason though... why is there something rather than nothing" ~ Great question! I have no idea but I wish I did know. Do you know?
"you can't look at this universe and all life and think it came from an explosion."
~ I don't, but I guess what you're are attempting to refer to is the cosmic event known as the big bang? That wasn't an explosion per say but rather an expansion from a singularity, this event has lots of evidence going for it, to name some: cosmic microwave background radiation, the "red-shift", basically what we do know is that a "big-bang" event did happen, what we don't know is the cause or explanation as to why it happened, again I wish I knew but I won't make up fake answers that have no evidence for them at all as this would be an appeal to ignorance fallacy.
Actually the church was the first to try and side with galileo, but after his fellow astronomers refused to look through the telescope so to speak, they then persecuted him. Also yes, we wouldn't have the scientific community if not for christianity, why do you think no such similar endeavor appeared in china when they were just as intelligent and capable of serious study. That kind of think didn't occur in the asian countries until the last century or so.
Briton go talent
You may well be right that some scientists felt that their belief in God helped them and motivated them, and I couldn't deny that. But so what? Other scientists have been motivated by belief in Buddha, or by getting their name in papers and seeking fame, and all sorts of other things.
Doesn't say much about Christianity's essential role in science, does it?
"Superstitions like he does". JL beliefs are based on the evidence supporting Christianity. It's improbable for a man of his intellect to have subjective beliefs. What kind of information could you provide to JL, to point him to a different direction?
yep kids its that time athiesm is the new religion on the block. followed with just as much fervor as those who perpetrated the Spanish inquisition. they will march relentlessly to crush and ridicule others beliefs.
Why is abiogenesis absurd? How do you know that given the right conditions and a billion years time, extremely simple life forms couldn't emerge?
The evolution distinction he makes seems to be a red herring. Evolution accounts for the diversity and existence of species, and is so parsimonious and well researched that it can hardly be falsified by the question of how life got going in the first place. Origin of life research is a field within its-self.
Christians believe this :
That the word became flesh in the person of Jesus Christ - Therefore man can come to know God through knowing Jesus Christ. So u can not say u can not come to know him - your opportunity is to know Christ -
No different how former atheists who are not stupid such as C.S Lewis came to faith. U can U tube - Phd comes to Christ or Dr Rosaria Butterfield or Dr Holly Ordway Phd. The answers u r looking for will never satisfy u its only through knowing (not gances at) Christ.
It's just silly to say that you need to presuppose that the universe is rationally intelligible to do science. It merely has to actually be the case that it *is* intelligible for science to be able to produce results. No scientist "presupposes" that he will find a solution when he starts an investigation. He tries to find out what's going on and build a model that has predictive power.
You can tell that Lennox is a mathematician/philosopher and not a scientist who's ever investigated anything.
Lennox is intellectually sufficient but his argument can go as far as the truth of his premise ....in other words 2+2 is not 5 even if Einstein said it poetically!!!!
Atheism shall fall under esoteric scientific knowlegde .
CREATION PROVES THERE MUST BE AN UNCAUSED, IMMATERIAL, 1st CAUSE and hence a gifted masterful, all -powerful CREATOR
PREMISE: Since a state of the physical world exists now, (be it quarks, black holes, Big Bangs or singularities, past & present universes,) there are only two plausible explanations: EITHER
a) Matter in some form has existed eternally in the past or
b) It was created by an external agent along with all time and space
That infinite past time is impossible is demonstrated thus:
1).The state of our present finite universe, (S1) exists because a previous state (S2) existed.
2). S2 exists because S3 existed as it did b/c S4 preceded it.
4) This can be summed up in the formula: Sn exists b/c state Sn+1 pre-existed it
5). As the state required for the existence of our present universe can never be reached from an infinite regress of past states, our universe cannot exist.
6) Our universe does exist.
7). Therefore, infinite past cannot be true. Infinite past time is a logical absurdity.
Since past time is finite and the physical realm exists in time, matter had to have been created by an atemporal, non-contingent immaterial uncaused cause - G O D
Next - so what about God's nature? An infinite past is an hypothetical point that can never be reached, for there is always one more event, unit of time or space before you get there. Only math sets like n(n+1) or the series 1,2,3, ~ to infinity are actual infinities. An infinite future however, is a virtual infinity since it is not yet realized, that is, it has not yet come into existence.
An infinite past, on the other hand, is an entirely different matter. While an infinite past, like an infinite future, can never be reached, it is impossible because an event in an infinite past requires an infinite amount of time for its effects to reach the present, and an infinite amount of time is an amount of time that can never be realized.
Think of a star existing an infinite distance away. Could its light ever reach us? Of course not. Therefore, a present time dependant upon events which happened in an infinite past simply cannot exist, nor can they ever exist, for in order for them to exist an infinite amount of time must first pass.
Ergo, to propose a universe which has an infinite past is to propose a universe which cannot exist.
Ergo, because we know the universe does indeed exist, we also know the universe does not have an infinite past.
Nothing in the Universe suggest a creator, on the contrary the more we discover as humans about the nature of the cosmos the more clearer it gets that we don't require a creator to account for anything.
Something always existed this is certain.
That something thought if far more plausible being something "simple" than extremely complicated.
In other words is extremely more plausible an underline code or structure essence always existed than a complex person with consciousness and eternal qualities.
Consciousness, intelligence comes late on Evolution and requires environment not at the beginning.
Infinite past is irrelevant because time begins with our UNVRS.
You demonstrate good logic but its completely outdated.
This argument could pass 2000 years ago in ancient Greece not in the quantum and relativity age.
Robby Bobby Actually the truth is exactly the opposite of what you say. You believe without any reason because is in human nature......You are driven by sentiment. I believe comforting to reason and evidence......I am doing the difficult stuff you are just riding the river of your nature.
And believe is not a choice.
Nether science nether reality .......AND CERTAINLY nether archaeology and history proves the existence of God. You dare say archaeology !! Even the Israel country had to admit that there is not a single evidence found supporting the biblical accounts in expense of their tourism.
Robby Bobby Everything is bigger than God because God doesn't exist. You say "why would anyone deny the " the easy and comfortable life ".......Because some of us are too intelligent to believe Hebrew immoral superstitious nonsense on no evidence.
As i told you believe is not a choice !! Ether you believe ether not. And by the way i don't see comfort being a subject to monster ho supposedly made places like Hell and sacrifice his son ...For some lesson ......I am better than that.
Robby Bobby What part of "i don't believe God exist" do you not get !! Do you seriously think that i believe God exist .....But i rather go to hell on stubbornness. How can be angry to something i don't believe it exist.
And given your arrogance not excepting my opinion i guess you have many evidence for your God ....Lets hear one!!
Right and wrong are related to thing that work in a given environment ......Bad and Good is related to our human wellbeing.
Kostas Spiliotopoulos You forgot to give me any evidence for your God .......Your argument so far is ......You are angry because you don't agree with me.
Its obvious that the reason you believe is on feelings.....Thats way you use words like anger, spoiled .....How about give some real evidence.
human intellect has gotten us to a point where we believe we can explain everything both scientifically and relegiously. i think the fundamental issue here is wheather the entity we have chosen to describe as God, that has come to being as a result of our gradual acknowlegdement of the splender of the universe and our inability to explain some of the questions it poses to us really requires the favour and advocacy of our species for its workings to continue running smoothly as the organised religious groups would like to have it. Or does this entity we call God need permission from the the scientific community's administrative department to continue creating these marveles we see all arround us.. human construts such as organised religion have reduced God to something that should be feared and done favours for as if it really needs that to fuel its existance...lets continue our quest for scientific and philosophical enlighentment but at the same time lets not be naiive enough to think that just because we've posses the right amount of brain powere then we can meassure in a laboratory the true scale of God.. P.S i also think the Fact that we call this entity God comes with conotations that tend to spark opposing ideas about it hence the scince vs religion contention..bottom line is that there must have been some something that got the ball rolling and our significance in the bigger scheme of things is more minute than we can ever start to imagine...
A sceptic may be briefly swayed by a theologian but his point is soon lost when the hardened skeptic is plunged back into his physical world of material indulgence. What’s needed is to undermine atheism’s faith in naturalism & all its materialistic assumptions is showing they are not supported by modern science. He wont be swayed by books on theology but the BEST scientists who draws theistic conclusions, will trouble him deeply.” (C.S Lewis)
“The chief aim of all investigations of the external world should be to discover the rational order and harmony which has been imposed on it by its Creator and which He revealed to us in the language of advanced mathematics.” -Johannes Kepler
Sir Lawrence Bragg, Nobel Prize in physics: “Science and religion are apposed , just as the fingers and thumb are apposed, so that between them we may grasp everything.
Roger Penrose on chance Vs fine-tuning!. “The conditions of the BB were so special that the probability that they came about by chance are 1x 10^123 power. "There has got to be incredible FINETUNING in the initial organization of the universe" See /evotionarynewsDOTorg. Taking into account all the other parameters, many scientists have come to espouse "The Anthropic Principle," which contends that the universe was brought into existence intentionally for the sake of producing mankind-a PURPOSE!
Want 100s more google "if you think science leads to atheism."
one can neither put into context nor perspective that which his mind is not designed to understand, same way humans can not digest cellulose due to our physiological design...
*billion* not billions. That's 1 billion years at most. That also assumes life didnt exist before the fossil, and that the earth was even capable of maintaining life since it was first made. Given that, and the massive improbablity of it, I think I am certainly justified in at least not believing it could come about by any undirected process materialist scientists postulate. Perhaps that doesn't prove design, but it certainly means I have grounds to say it was designed.
Questions for atheists"
-Do you believe that raping and torturing children is bad? Because if you do then you must believe that the reason you hold that view is simply down to random chance and time and not for any other reason.
-Do you reject the gospels because of their content before you have considered their historical reliability? And if not, why are they unreliable documents?
-Why do you care about other people believing in God if you know He doesn't exist?
Easy.
I believe these things are wrong because they are demknstrably bad for society and harmful for everyone. and therefore we ought not do it. I dont believe in objective morality though, and I dont think you can prove it exists.
I reject the bible because of the ignorant and violent doctrines it promotes and the self-contradictory propositions throughout. An omniscient god could also have surely cleared up the confusion about slavery and other doctrines disagreed upon by honest truth seeking christians and non christians.
I care about people believing in god because it halts science. It is divisive. It inspires violence and hatred. Personally i can not come out atheist to my family or i will be cast out. I can not be myself because christianity teaches people to be unsatisfied with letting people be non-christian. Christianity also informs oppressive political policies and starts wars and gives people excuses to do things like murder homosexuals, own slaves, and bomb abortion clinics. We know better. And this doubles as a rebuttal against your biblical morality.
@@freethoughtgreg6424 If you read the bible carefully, I think you'd see that there is a lot of kindness and love in the bible and the danger of hatred especially. Hatred seems to come from misunderstanding and refusing things that radically divert from ones own views both for good and bad. You could say that the advancements of science and the devaluing of nature are evil because of the amount of damage done to the environment and to each other. Not all progress can be seen as good considering how society only considers itself and then really focuses on environmental issues when it gets REALLY bad. I myself believe in God but accept Science and many heads in science do believe or have believed in God.
Atheist live in a FICTION WORLD, while 99.9 percent of the world lives in a FACT WORLD, those who understand God is real. So how can one argue or debate with people who live in a fiction world? No chance of making them see, any sense to their lives. 90 percent of them, sadly, die in despair.
One example: all other religious books, place the existance ot their god(s) within spacetime of our universe. The bible places God out of our spacetime. There other things that are importantly different in the bible versus other religious books. eg The beginning of life, the physical form and situation of the earth in the universe, etc. etc No other religious book comes near the scientificaly correctness even the bible isn·t a scientific book.
2: Time to study up. "Because they have mass" is simply wrong.
It's very clear that you don't grasp the whole concept of "God", which is why you ask all these questions. The only relevant question you've asked, is "How do you know God is still around?", all the others are questions you will never get answers you can be pleased with, simply because God is way more advanced than we can ever imagine. We can't simply answer what he consist of, and explain his every thought. If we could, we'd be God.
THEY say it is severely improbably, I'm jus using their words. Yes that does give me reason to believe Life was designed, even if it wasn't designed by god, the implications are still there. You also make the mistake of thinking this in someway is even central to my arguement. Just because God would explain this doesn't mean its any foundational belief, infact this evidence just reinforces what I already expected. IF you think we will one day discover how life started, that's science of the gaps
Wait a minute... so we don't have a full understanding of the beginning of life... therefore that implies life was designed? Or, therefore that gives you reason to believe life was designed?
What on EARTH are you talking about? I personally think that science will have a more complete picture of the beginning of life, but that's just an opinion, and I don't base my worldview on it. I'm quite content to say that we just don't have a detailed understanding of the beginning of life.
Don't be rediculous that isn't at all my arguements. Anyways enjoy your "materialism of the gaps".
Give me that ol' time evolution, that's good enough for me.
I find it hilarious that the two things you claim I'm unable to do just happen to be the same ones you can't spell.
In such a vast mechanism as the human brain it is statistically impossible that any representation controlled by random occurrence could be correct. There is only one correct answer to 2+2, and there are an infinite number of wrong answers. There is only one correct theory that explains how plants convert sunlight to energy and there are potentially an infinite number of theories that incorrectly explain this process. On a side note the camera man should be shot.
Yes, and then scientists in the coming centuries realized that you don't need to ground logic in God. It's quite a desperate attempt on your part to claim that science is somehow indebted to Christianity. Just think about what you're saying: Kepler and Galileo faced incredible persecution for sharing their scientific ideas with the religious world.
Science doesn't need Christianity.
“Science depends on an assumption of the rational intelligibility of the universe” ???? I’m no scientist but that is twaddle. Science is just pigging around with stuff to see what happens. What happens just happens, and we learn a bit about the stuff. Twaddle twiddle twaddle. And don’t no one mention free will ffs.
There are lots of evidence for religions and those evidence prove that religions existed. But the evidence that religions existed or the evidence that religion has presented does not prove god exists. Lennox may talk all he wants but at the end of the day he has got no proof. He says ridiculous thing like "god sent his son to earth". This proves being expert in mathematics or other sciences does not exclude one to be delusional.
Lol as if science is actively trying to fight religion. Most scientists (myself included) don't even think about superstitious shit when we're at the lab (or the office). It's a waste of time!
It's okay. He might wake up one day lol
Mathematical developments and technological developments are not the same as science. True the greeks had logical inquiry but how much did they discover about the world? Next to nothing, nor china nor india, nearly all modern science stems from Europe, and what was the biggest contributer to European development? Religion, more specificaly some form of christianity. I made up nothing, the greeks had philosophy I'll give you that, but the dedicated testing and observing methods come from Europe.
2) this is also nothing to do with the bigger issue you raised about "creationism". I've pointed out the evidence of evolution is trivial at best, and I say this without theological grounds, but evidentiary grounds. And you retorted with a strawman about me believing in somehting contrary to science, namely the earth's age. I explained to you very clearly what the Bible actually says, and this in no way contradicts what are best guesses about history before humans was.
It's not as if God's relevance has been rationally demonstrated and I am simply being willfully ignorant. This isn't an issue of free will to accept or reject an offer like choosing among ice cream flavors at a shop. For me to genuinely accept the offer, my conscience would have to be convinced of truth value behind the God claim. That aside, an excuse from being judged for lack of belief is a petty issue. Why should God even bother judging me on this matter? Sounds childish and vindictive.
There mass behind a thought is the brain. Where is the mass for god Mr logical theist?
If man does not know god then why man makes up religion and pretend to represent god?
God of the Gaps
Appeal to ignorance
personal gain
Arrogance
Delusion
Lots of reasons...
I don't know where they came up with that "god of the gaps" nonsense and no scientist clearly understand everything/anything so I don't know what the garbage is about.
I have lost all respect for Lennox.
My OpenMind Because he goes against your worldview? He's telling the truth. Atheism holds the creationist worldview to a standard that itself can't stand up to
Untrue. I don't claim to know, atheism doesn't make any claims.
Lennox is lying when he claims that he does and that a theistic god is a meaningful explanation. I'm not even sure he actually believe what he spins.
+My OpenMind Open your mind dear fellow . We are all faced with the same questions
Either God exists or he doesn't
either theism is true or materialism is true
either mind came from matter or matter came from mind
either ultimate reality is transcendent or mindless matter is the only game in town.
either Creation is true or time/matter/energy is eternal in the past
either the universe has an uncaused cause or it popped into existence out of nothing
either the universe is a lawless, lifeless chaos or it is fine-tuned by design
either our fine-tuned, rationally intelligible universe came about by sheer
chance or a rationally intelligent cause.
either the ABSTRACT laws of science, logic and math exist only in a physical brain or in the abstract mind of their Creator who defined this awe-inspiring world into existence.
either nature is endowed with these laws, or all physical processes including abiogenesis & evolution were the product of blind forces, unguided processes and chance.
Either something is right even if nobody is right or it is always wrong even if everybody is wrong?
Either life has meaning, hope and destiny or we're just a bunch of selfish
genes with no purpose, no hope and no escape. either morality is merely a
spinoff & by-product of socio-biological evolution or a Moral Law Giver
Either we're all biological machines in motion or have an eternal soul,
either we’re spiritual beings having a brief physical experience or “a bunch of selfish genes fighting for survival in a world of pitiless indifference”
either we're just future worm fodder or part of God's providential plan. Which worldview then, offers a deep sense of joy, meaning hope and destiny?
Nothing new in the claims you make. Ill believe it when you provide some evidence. In the meantime lets explore the unknown with an open mind and not make claims about clearly manmade deities, the universe and then pretend that these things are facts.
Why does religion feel the need to claim to have the knowledge it doesn't? when the appeal to certainty?
There is evidence for evolution. The afterglow of the big bang has been observed.
We can hypothesise about cosmic origins ( arxiv.org/pdf/hep-th/0702178.pdf ) and test those theories.
Can you name one instance where there was a disagreement between religion and science where when the matter was settles the correct answer turned out to be the religious one?
My OpenMind Yes, I could name numerous instances of science having been proven wrong, where "religion" had it right all along. But, you are confusing religion with theology.....not the same thing.
What, on Earth, is he talking about? It's like listening to Sarah Palin!
***** Afraid that's the best I can do with this religobabble.
***** How do you reason with an adult that believes in a talking snake!?
Ian M read his discussion on literalism or watch seven days that divide the world....otherwise have the guts to join an academic discussion....instead of trying to make a highly intelligent man look like a fool
*****
Speaking in science can solve all your problem and have all the answer that is really brilliant indeed. Believe in North Korea leader (Kim Jong Un), Castro and also many others as well such as those prostitutes, prisoners, drug addicts etc who they are brilliant guys simply bec. they don't believe in God. People believe in God can not be intelligent or brilliant. I will put you in the same categories as those not believing in God, that is truly brilliant and admire you guys.
Jim Mulrooney An academic discussion is not at all necessary - the common sense of a seven year old, that fairy tales are not real, will suffice.
I'm not sure why you are so ignorant about these issues when all you have to do is do a quick google search. The first forms of life as we recognize it today are thought to have appeared about 1 billion years after the formation of the earth. That's a long time.
Guy happy, look up the genetic fallacy.
Look up literally every fallacy. Lennox uses them almost every 5 minutes... its amazing that people still revere him as an effective apologist
Nice pseudo intellectualism there even if religion was wrong it doesn't disprove god
The only thing that makes sence to me is the word crap. All the other things are are highly blownup retoric without any added value. TRhe crap I understand,; its the same crap you use to crithesice(sic) the bible and God, but wich you want here about if it is used in favor of the bible or to debunk statements of you over the bible that are clearly false. The bible gives thents of scientific statements were a lot of are just descovered in the last hounderd years, some even shorter. B.L.N.T. :D
Delusional
Why do you say that?