I was recently directed to the above video featuring notable atheist Matt Dillahunty (with whom I have had interaction in the past). In it, Dillahunty makes a number of elementary mistakes that are quite common among popular-level criticisms of intelligent design. I thought it would be worthwhile to offer a short respon se. Misrepresenting Intelligent Design His first mistake … [Read more...]
Book Review: Who's Afraid Of The Multiverse?
Introduction As a Christian who is deeply interested in the sciences and what they bring to the table for defending the existence of God (and the truth of the Christian worldview, specifically), I have often encountered the idea that multiple worlds may exist, which seems to explain away the beginning of the universe and its designed features. When I heard that astrophysicist … [Read more...]
Cosmological Dialogue Concerning God’s Existence
Jane: Leibniz stated that “[w]hatever is not from something else is from itself, or from its own essence.”1 Would you agree with the axiom that everything that exists has an explanation of its existence either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause? John: Yes. Given the Principle of Sufficient Reason, I would agree with that axiom. Jane: Would you also agree … [Read more...]
A List of My Recorded Interviews, Debates and Talks To-Date
Over the past couple of years, I have been privileged to have the opportunity to participate in a number of radio and podcast interviews and debates, as well as present a number of lectures on subjects of interest to Christians. Those that have been recorded lie scattered around the internet, and so I thought it would be a good idea to compile the links to these resources into … [Read more...]
Principles in Revolution
A Review of The Principle Shortly before his death in 1543, Nicolaus Copernicus published De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres) in which he proposed that the motion of the planets could be better explained by assuming that the sun, rather than the earth, sits at the center of the universe (the Solar System being the extent of … [Read more...]
Is Intelligent Design A Circular Argument? A Response to Matt Dillahunty
On Sunday night, I called into the Atheist Experience, an atheist TV show based out of Austin, Texas. It is a weekly call in program, airing every Sunday at 4:30 till 5:30pm Central and can be viewed on ustream. The recording of my discussion with Matt Dillahunty from Sunday night (I am the first and longest caller) can still be found online (mp3; video). It is unfortunate … [Read more...]
Objection(s) to the Ontological Argument
It may be strange to some that there are philosophical objections raised by Christians against arguments for belief in God. For example, St. Anselm's "Ontological Proof" (as it would come to be called) was taken under a critical lens when Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) took consideration of the argument in his epic Summa Theologiae (ST hereafter). Over the last year or so, I have … [Read more...]
Quality of Life in the Multiverse
The universe appears to be fine-tuned for life. For example, seemingly infinitesimal adjustments to the dark-energy density or gravitational constant would render most conceivable forms of life impossible. Adjusting the dark energy, for example, would result in either no planets or a collapsed universe.[1] Clearly, cosmic fine-tuning is necessary (although not sufficient) … [Read more...]
Unnaturalness of Atheism
The idea that atheism ought be assumed by default is a chimera. Atheism cannot be assumed by default, it must be demonstrated. The belief that given the failure of theistic case for God, atheism ought be assumed does not only commit an appeal to ignorance but is also against the picture painted by modern discoveries in Cognitive Science of Religion (CSR). Several recent … [Read more...]
Understanding the arguments in God’s not Dead: Part II of III
In part one we looked at the arguments advanced by Professor Radisson, now we come to the arguments Josh put forward as he took the floor. The first argument Josh talked about is called the Cosmological Argument for the existence of God. This comes in many different versions, all of which have interesting aspects. Yet all of them have in common the idea of a first cause, … [Read more...]