Category Archives: Epistemology

THE SCIENCE IS NEVER SETTLED. SCIENCE IS NO ESCAPE FROM THE HUMAN CONDITION. (Part 2)

Further thoughts that continue on from Part 1 here.

Science is no escape from the human condition… that gospel purported by many…is false.

Though we may increase in mastery over nature…certainty will always escape us… thus science is a pragmatic pursuit, not a source of absolute knowledge.

With every new answer comes new questions.
We will always rely on axioms and presuppositions… we cannot escape the need for faith… which underpins what we think we know… even the things we are most sure about….

I guess my original post could have been called… ‘Beware of Scientism’.

History shows you can ‘prove’ almost anything by fiddling with numbers.

It must be understood that not even math escapes the human condition… I know many people will be loosing their lunch over my impertinence… yet with time I hope to explain the many ways math can be corrupted.

When reading about various types of weird ‘inferred postulates’ like Dark Matter, The Big Bang, etc we always find two camps of thought.

Simpletons who think the said phenomena are rock solid facts and proceed to treat them as such in all their forthcoming activities… and others who have the intellectual depth and integrity to admit these cherished theories are full of holes… and proceed with caution in any further speculations that could follow.

It depends on which article you read as to whether or not you are encouraged to accept such phenomena are real … or to remain skeptical.

It is particularly scary when the political class pick up on certain theories… because they suit their political agendas… and begin to compel whole populations into accepting them as indisputable… and then using usurpatious powers proceed to embed them in Laws and institutions… Pouring Tax billions into the pockets of scientists who just so happen to produce politically correct ‘findings’… while critics are deplatformed and thrown out of Seats of learning… and making it nearly a crime to question ‘the official line’.

Science has died.
The Balance has been skewed.
What we are left with is Pure Pseudo science… very much like the Social Darwinism of the Nazis which Sub-humanised the Jews.

What is funny is that so many people naively assume such shocking corruption is not going on today!

The truth is there are many factors that can corrupt science… Money and political agendas being two biggies… and anywhere the State is pouring money into ‘research’… it becomes highly dubious.

Another funny yet erroneous stereotype that was born of the Materialist religion of ‘Scientism’ is the image of Doctors and scientists in white lab coats with thick reading glasses… and expressionless demeanor.
The psychological impact of this upon gullible minds is the impression that scientists are not only way smarter than other mortals… but esp that they embody a ‘Spock-like’ power of Objectivity… that all their utterances are devoid of personal prejudices… all this is designed to get the gullible to trust them.

Their white overcoats serve the very same purpose as the priestly gab of any religious cult!

The truth is the exact opposite.
You would struggle to find in any other area of life a more opinionated, conceited, biased, Vain, Greedy, unprincipled, and obstinate bunch of human beings than you find in science departments!

Pseudo-science are myths dressed up in Scientific Gab/ jargon.

Is it any wonder why there are so many pseudo-scientific ideas that hold sway among the masses???

When false postulates and theories are accepted as fact whole magnificent edifices are constructed upon these corrupt foundations.
Entire lifetimes, and reputations, and industries can be wasted building ‘White Elephants’… and strong vested interests assemble to carry on the lies… because the longer the sham continues… the bigger the mess when it topples… and people fear facing the ugly truth… and paying the price of correction.

The lies become so embedded that it seems like madness to question them…. Cognitive dissonance becomes the norm… an incapacity to acknowledge uncomfortable novel truths.

Progress has always had to battle with entrenched Mass-held delusions. What is funny/sad is so many Moderns only apply this precept in their warped conception that Science has always struggled against religion… a very inaccurate and simplistic apprehension of history… utterly failing to guard themselves against all the other personal bents that can prevent them from grasping new and challenging evidences.
esp their own modern post-Christian quazi-religious bents.

I ask people if they dare to entertain any controversial propositions that are at variance with the mainstream?
For it is a signal of an independent mind to walk it’s own path and have the courage to diverge at certain points from the herd.
The herd has been trained to pour derision and hate upon anyone who steps out of line and does not submit to the ‘orthodoxy’ of their times.

It may amaze people that I am talking about *The scientific community*… not some religious sect.
Understand that the scientific community is as prone to Backwards, erroneous dogma as any other Human endeavor is.

What is essential then is to write a code of ethics of which the scientific method is just one aspect of what entails the correct mental processes that are conducive to the scientific enterprise.

. to guard ourselves from slipping into a mire of our own subjectivity… eg with the interpretation of evidence.

Ultimately all we can do is acknowledge the human factor will always be lurking about… like a madman.

Tim Wikiriwhi
Christian Libertarian.

More from Tim… and others…

SCIENCE: THE NEW MYTHOLOGY.

THE RUSTY CAGE: SCIENTISM.

SUPERSTITION?

ET TU BRUTE? WHAT IS SCIENTISM: WILLIAM LANE CRAIG

THE FOLLY OF SCIENTISM. AUSTIN L. HUGHES

MULTIPLYING ABSURDITIES EQUALS CERTAINTY… THE MATH MAGIC OF MODERN ATHEIST ASTROLOGERS!

DAVID BERLINSKI—ATHEISM AND ITS SCIENTIFIC PRETENSIONS

THE WALLS ARE CLOSING IN ON ATHEISM… NOT THEISM.

THE LUDICROUS CLAIMS OF EVOLUTION! WHY NOT ESP?

The Science is never settled. Science is no escape from the human condition.

Below are some thoughts I threw together for a Social media post.
Not sure how they will weather… lets see!

This has now extended into 2 parts of which this is part 1.

Part 2 is here.

Science is no escape from the human condition… that gospel purported by many…is false.

Though we may increase in mastery over nature…certainty will always escape us… thus science is a pragmatic pursuit, not a source of absolute knowledge.

With every new answer comes new question.
We will always rely on axioms and presuppositions… we cannot escape the need for faith… which underpins what we think we know… even the things we are most sure about….

I am an Engineer by trade having served as an apprentice back in the 80s.
I studied General science and Engineering at high school… two subjects I excelled in given I enjoyed them both, yet to get into the Engineers class meant not being allowed to study ‘physics’ and ‘chemistry’ as two independent classes that were more specialist than general science.

The School must have thought General science was sufficient for engineers! (There is an element of truth to this)

Anyway I have never regretted my decision to learn a trade via ‘Hands on apprenticeship system’… we would spend several months a year at a Technical institute learning theory, the rest was learning on the job. I did a ‘fitting and turning’ apprenticeship which is machine work… lathes mills, etc plus ‘fitting’ which was welding and fabrication, and mechanic stuff. Best of all at you are earning coin and don’t graduate with a massive student debt.

Yet you learn ‘different’ things via an apprenticeship than what you learn when you go to University.
We learn mostly Newtons theories of Physics rather than Einstein’s.
And that does in the end have it’s disadvantages as I will confess to struggling with matters of Relativity and the claims of Quantum Physics… which I must do my best to learn at home by dent of my own desire to learn.

I must content myself at best with Laymen’s understanding.

I do accept that Einstein had a more accurate model for how the universe functions and that the State of the Art requires utilisation of his equations.

This achievement of Einstein to challenge Newton in itself must be one of the most important contentions that must be factored into… and embodied in any ‘philosophy of science’ if you hope to have a valid understanding of what science is… and what it is not.

Newton appeared absolute and unquestionable!
That was ‘the verdict of Science’.
Anyone who questioned him was automatically a crackpot.
Mad Einstein did exactly that… and in so doing exploded the notion that Science is a foundation for absolute truth… absolute knowledge… Newton was overthrown, and cracks are beginning to appear even in Einstein. This should at least rattle the nerves of arrogant ‘know it alls’ who think they have attained God-like certainty and omniscience!

Given we now know how little we know that such attitudes still hold sway says more about Human beings irrationality and prejudice… and incapacity for objectivity. Don’t you think?

On the other hand by grounding myself in swaff and metal filings … and big hammers and avoiding the indoctrinations of ivory tower intellectuals has given me ‘a freedom of thought’… whereby I stand on the outside… looking in at all the whack claims being made by Quantum physics, etc… and intuitively I can see these guys are wallowing in math-madness…

for example their massive claims about Dark matter! To me it is as mythical as the Loch Ness monster! I don’t buy into it…. and sure enough new theories arise that relegate ‘Dark matter’ to the dustbin of vain imagination.
Science is a learning process at best… never mistake wild assertions as actual facts!

For the sort of Engineering I do Newton is still King!
Yet we learn that ‘correlation does not prove causation…’ a very important thing to understand in our age of computer modeling whereby almost any hair-brain idea can be given ‘credence’ by fiddling with numbers and parameters.

I would suggest that Global warming is founded upon such pseudo-scientific modeling that was bespoke made to accommodate Political aspirations…
Michael Mann’s ‘Hockey stick graph’ is today absolutely debunked yet the damage it has done in skewing science has been incalculable.

The science is far from settled… on anything.

Have a nice day!

Tim Wikiriwhi
Christian Libertarian.

Keep calm and carry on

Suppose I’m trying to live a Christian life.

Jesus is the Word, and the Word clearly says that the most important rules in life are to love God and to love others.

2013_02_03

Then one of [the Pharisees], which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying,

Master, which is the great commandment in the law?

Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.

This is the first and great commandment.

And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. (KJV)

I’m an abject sinner. Nonetheless, I do try to do what’s right. In fact, I’ve mostly always tried to do what’s right. Even before I turned to Christ. You see, I have an inbuilt moral compass. A God-given moral compass. God is the font of morality.

Just as we all have an inbuilt knowledge of God, so, too, we all have an inbuilt moral compass. What is a moral compass, exactly? The term ‘moral compass’ is shorthand for a set of moral sentiments, certain basic moral beliefs and the ability to engage in moral deliberation. And empathy. Hence the Golden Rule.

Whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them. (ESV)

Your moral compasss is kind of like a speedometer in a car. If you’re trying to keep to the speed limit (as, of course, you should) then respect what your speedometer tells you.

speedometer-showing-50

We’re all supposed to have a God-given moral compass, one that points due moral north. Just in case it’s a bit broken and wavery, our parents are supposed to teach us right from wrong.

Not all parents are perfect, however. As a result of imperfect parenting, sometimes our children turn out to be gluttonous, stubborn, rebellious drunkards, who curse us.

Sometimes our children even commit heinous crimes and end up in jail.

I was in prison and you came to me. (ESV)

Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them. (ESV)

As parents, we stand by our children. We love them, no matter what. At least, that’s what most parents do or would do and it’s what my moral compass tells me is how parents should treat their prodigal offspring. (I’m lucky in that my own children are model citizens. 🙂 )

But certain passages in the Torah (the first five books of the Old Testament, also known as the Pentateuch) tell an entirely different story.

For anyone who curses his father or his mother shall surely be put to death; he has cursed his father or his mother; his blood is upon him. (ESV)

If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and, though they discipline him, will not listen to them, then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city at the gate of the place where he lives, and they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This our son is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ Then all the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones. So you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all Israel shall hear, and fear. (ESV)

1921008_816321808381387_1610350170_o

Whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets. (ESV)

I wish that others wouldn’t batter me with rubble.

I was once a stubborn and rebellious son who didn’t obey the voice of his father. Had I been stoned to death with stones by all the men of the city I wouldn’t be writing this here today. Luckily all that happened was an interview with my school headmaster. Hang all the Law and the Prophets!

When my moral compass and the Torah collide, I follow Jesus.

diSsIMuLAtion

saving_the_french10

Where are the moderate Muslim voices condemning the violence?

That’s what the likes of Fox News ask whenever masked terrorists shouting “Allahu Akbar” fire shots with automatic weapons killing swathes of innocent Westerners before departing the scene shouting, “We have avenged the Prophet Mohammed,” as happened in the recent Charlie Hebdo shooting in Paris.

Fox’s own Monica Crowley, for example, said that Muslims “should be condemning” the attack and that she hadn’t “heard any condemnation… from any groups.” Fox News’ America’s Newsroom guest Steve Emerson complained, “you don’t see denunciations of radical Islam, by name, by mainstream Islamic groups.” Bob Beckel, a host of Fox News’ The Five host said Muslims were “being quiet” about the shooting and accused the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) of keeping “their mouth shut when things happen.”

Raw Story gives 46 examples of Muslim outrage about Paris shooting that Fox News can’t seem to find in an attempt to discredit Fox News.

Wait, what? Only 46 examples? A good many of the cited condemnations of the violence are tweets from individuals on Twitter. There are a handful from the foreign ministers of Muslim countries. Only a dozen or so statements are from representatives of large Islamic organisations. But there are between 1.5 and 2 billion Muslims in the world, depending on who’s counting. 46 out of billions isn’t very many. It’s near silence from the so-called moderate Muslim majority over this outrage!

Or so it might seem to someone predisposed to blame Islam, rather than Islamic extremism, for the all-too-frequent acts of Islam-related terrorism in today’s world. But the sad truth of the matter is that we simply don’t know how many moderate Muslims condemn durka durka Mohammed jihad. And we don’t know whether they’d be reported doing so by the MSM if they did.

I posted a couple of pictures of moderate Muslims demonstrating for peace before. Clearly one of them is photoshopped, but which one? (Perhaps they both are. I forget.)

Will the real Islam please stand up? Are the masked homicidal gunmen who stormed the offices of Charlie Hebdo the true representatives of Islam? Or is the hard-working and law-abiding Muslim family who own and run your corner store the true faces of the religion of peace?

Seriously, folks. Can’t you see that there’s an epistemic problem here? Is Islam the root cause of the problem? Or something else? I don’t really know and, may I respectively suggest, neither do you.

Abdel-Fatah-al-Sisi-012

Credit where it’s due says blogger Brendan McNeill, upon whom I rely to keep tabs on what Mohammed’s followers are up to.

I have previously reflected that nothing short of a reformation of Islam will ever allow its followers to co-exist peacefully with other faith communities. It seems the Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who is himself a Muslim, agrees and is apparently unafraid to say so.

Speaking before Al-Azhar and the Awqaf Ministry on New Year’s Day, 2015, and in connection to Prophet Muhammad’s upcoming birthday, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, a vocal supporter for a renewed vision of Islam, made what must be his most forceful and impassioned plea to date on the subject.

McNeill then quotes from al-Sisi’s speech in which the Egyptian President declares that Islam “is in need of a religious revolution,” before concluding

President Sisi is a brave man. Normally, to utter these words would be an automatic death sentence. It may still prove to be.

Is al-Sisi’s speech a reason for optimism? Perhaps, but there’s a bigger problem than that which already makes al-Sisi’s future assassination a very real possibility. A further epistemic problem to exacerbate the one we already have.

I’ve previously blogged on tawriya which is the Muslim doctrine of double entendre.

Now here’s Wikipedia to say a few words about taqiyya, the Muslim doctrine that allows lying in certain circumstances—primarily when Muslim minorities live under infidel authority.

In Shi’a Islam, taqiyya (تقیة taqiyyah/taqīyah) is a form of religious dissimulation, or a legal dispensation whereby a believing individual can deny his faith or commit otherwise illegal or blasphemous acts while they are in fear or at risk of significant persecution. The corresponding concept in Sunni Islam is known as idtirar (إضطرار) “coercion”. A related concept is known as kitman “concealment; dissimulation by omission”. Also related is the concept of ḥiyal, legalistic deception practiced not necessarily in a religious context but to gain political or legalistic advantage.

Can we trust any of the moderate Muslims condemning violent jihad? Can we even trust al-Sisi? A friend on Facebook thinks we can’t. He says

be in no doubt it was a very brave thing for Sisi to say unless of course he is practicing Taquiyya which is the islamic doctrine of being able to lie or decieve to protect or further islam.

I don’t know if we can trust al-Sisi or not. How could I know? (He’s a politician, after all.)

Christianity does not permit lying. Not even white lies. We are called to worship God in spirit and in truth. The fact that Islam does permit lying in certain circumstances and even has a name for the practice is of the utmost concern.

Not least because it gives anti-Islamic factions in Western society a free pass to practise a modern-day form of medieval witch dunking, also known as ordeal by water.

Ordeal by water was associated with the witch hunts of the 16th and 17th centuries: an accused who sank was considered innocent, while floating indicated witchcraft.

BatWitch04-Big

Innocent accused who sank drowned. Guilty accused who floated were executed for witchcraft. So the accused was damned if she did, damned if she didn’t. (See also the Biblical test for an unfaithful wife.)

Muslims who don’t protest the violence of their extremist co-religionists are accused of condoning terrorism by not speaking out. Muslims who do protest are accused of committing taqiyya. Thus, in the eyes of many, there are no moderate Muslims, just as there were none left living among those women of medieval times accused, rightly or wrongly, of witchcraft.

(Point illustrated. In fact, with respect to dunking, “the notion that the ordeal was flatly devised as a situation without any possibility of live acquittal, even if the outcome was ‘innocent’, is a modern elaboration.”)

Lying is wrong. And the fate of all habitual liars is that eventually no one believes them. That Muslims are so widely regarded with suspicion is a fate that Islam has wrought upon itself.

Slow down

Suppose I’m driving down the road.

It’s a built-up area and the road signage clearly indicates that the designated speed limit is 50 km/h.

New_Zealand_RG-1_(50_kmh).svg

I’m late, I’m in a hurry, I’m supposed to be somewhere. Nonetheless, I try to keep to the speed limit. Glancing down at my speedometer, I see that the reading is steady on 50 km/h.

speedometer-showing-50

I maintain my current speed. Well and good.

Then, looking up, I see I’m approaching one of those radar speed signs that displays the speed of the immediately oncoming vehicle, mine. It reads 80 km/h and flashes me to SLOW DOWN.

radar_speed_sign

How fast am I really going?

Should I slow down? Or should I keep calm and carry on?

I’m an agnostic. (Don’t ask me why.)

Last month I posted the following Facebook status.

I’m an agnostic. (Don’t ask me why.)

I meant it mainly as a joke.

Let me explain. An agnostic is someone who doesn’t know. So if you ask me why I’m an agnostic, I’m going to answer, “I don’t know!”

375885

I meant it mainly as a joke, but I also meant it partly as a statement of fact about me.

The term ‘agnostic’ was coined by 19th century English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley (who, incidentally, is best remembered as “Darwin’s Bulldog” for his advocacy of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution). He derived the term from the (Ancient) Greek ἀ- (a-), meaning “without”, and γνῶσις (gnōsis), meaning “knowledge”. Hence, the literal meaning of ‘agnostic’ is someone without knowledge. Huxley said

Agnosticism, in fact, is not a creed, but a method, the essence of which lies in the rigorous application of a single principle … Positively the principle may be expressed: In matters of the intellect, follow your reason as far as it will take you, without regard to any other consideration. And negatively: In matters of the intellect do not pretend that conclusions are certain which are not demonstrated or demonstrable.

Agnosticism is not a creed. Agnosticism says nothing about anything. That’s how it’s entirely possible (and, in my opinion, entirely desirable) to be both an agnostic and a Christian.

Agnosticism is not a creed. It’s a method(ology) only. And it’s about what conclusions are certain. (I’m not sure, but I think I’m not entirely certain about anything.)

I’ve studied more than enough philosophy to know not to put too much trust in the evidence of the senses or the deliverances of human reason. That’s one reason why the following is one of my favourite scriptures.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart
And do not lean on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge Him,
And He will make your paths straight. (NASB)

Do not lean on your own understanding. Seems pretty agnostic to me.

Sensus divinitatis

newscientistgodissue

For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. (NIV)

A while ago I borrowed a friend’s copy of the New Scientist’s special edition, the God Issue. (Note to self: Return it!) Contrary to the tiresome claim of online atheist trolls, that everyone’s born an atheist, it turns out that

The vast majority of humans are “born believers”, naturally inclined to find religious claims and explanations attractive and easily acquired, and to attain fluency in using them.

Justin L. Barrett, the author of the article, then goes on to say

This attraction to religion is an evolutionary by-product of our ordinary cognitive equipment, and while it tells us nothing about the truth or otherwise of religious claims it does help us see religion in an interesting new light.

Of course, Barrett would say that. And, of course, that’s not the only explanation of human beings’ natural tendency to theism. Reformation theologian John Calvin wrote that

God himself, to prevent any man from pretending ignorance, has endued all men with some idea of his Godhead, the memory of which he constantly renews and occasionally enlarges

Calvin explains, Barrett explains away. The distinction between explaining and explaining away is an important one. I think the consistent atheist/Naturalist incurs an unfeasibly costly explanatory overhead.

But that discussion’s for another day. Really, this somewhat shallow blog post of my own is just a protracted excuse to post some awesome Christian deathcore from awesome Christian deathcore band I Built The Cross.

For somewhat greater depth on the current topic, I recommend Glenn Peoples’s awesome blog post Born Atheists? Science and Natural belief in God.

See also Psalm 19:1 (for something a little more soothing).

In the jar

10462753_10152385834254543_1964188277831426513_n

Once upon a time I was a real philosopher. I wasn’t a very good philosopher then, and I’m certainly not now, but here’s an argument for the truth of Christianity. If you fancy yourself as a philosopher, feel free to shoot my argument down in flames. But if you fancy yourself as a real philosopher, do what a real philosopher would do. Improve my argument, so that it’s as good an argument as it can possibly be. And then shoot it down in flames!

Okay, so here goes. Lately, something called the multiverse theory has become popular in atheist circles. It purports to explain why the universe we live in appears to be fine-tuned for the existence of life, without the universe we live in actually being fine-tuned for the existence of life. Because what best explains the fact that the universe we live in is fine-tuned for the existence of life, if it’s the only universe, is the existence of a creator God. If, however, our universe is only one of trillions upon trillions of other actual parallel universes, each with different physical laws and constants, then we can find the explanation for the apparent fine-tuning of the universe we happen to inhabit in the so-called anthropic principle. Basically, we’re here because of sheer, dumb luck and the probabilistic resources of a multiverse.

Atheist Logo

As far as I’m aware, there’s no empirical evidence for the multiverse theory, but it does at least explain why most atheists believe in pink unicorns. So there is that. Now, my argument appeals to the idea of multiple possible universes. The possible worlds heuristic has been a mainstay of academic philosophy for a very long time. Since I’ve been around, anyway. I think my argument only depends on the existence of a finite number of possible universes, and not on the existence of an infinite number of actual universes, but I’m not sure. But the question is, if there are multiple possible universes, but only one actual universe, which of the multiple possible universes is the actual universe we live in?

Well, it could be that the universe we live in is, in actual fact, contained in a tiny glass jar placed neatly on the shelf of an alien child’s room. It’s a logical possibility. The thing to note about this possibility is that it’s a possibility that our universe is contained within another universe. Thus, this possibility is a variant of what I have elsewhere called supernaturalism. Naturalism, as I define it, is the view that the world we know is a stand-alone affair. It’s not contained within anything else, or a product of anything else. It’s self-sufficient from go to whoa. It just is. Whereas, supernaturalism is the view that the world we live in—and all it contains, including us—is an artefact.

Now consider all the logically possible universes. Logically speaking, what is the likelihood that the one-and-only actual universe is a self-contained universe, as opposed to a universe contained within a greater reality? Bear in mind that the the universe inhabited by the alien child, in whose room our universe is contained in a jar on a shelf, could itself be contained in another jar on a shelf in some uber-alien child’s room. That’s right, for every possible self-contained universe, there are an infinite number of possible nested universes containing that universe. So it’s highly likely that we live in a nested universe.

God is eternal. The claim that God is eternal is often taken to mean (as I take it to mean) that God is “outside” time and space. God is outside the time and space fabric of our universe, which means that our universe is “inside” the outside reality in which God dwells. If Christianity is true, we live in a nested universe.

There are two types of possible nested universes. Those in which the creator in the containing universe has communicated with the inhabitants of the contained universe, and those in which the creator hasn’t. What would our world look like if we lived in a universe within a universe? Moreover, one in which the creator outside had communicated with us in the jar? It would look exactly like this one looks if Christianity were true. Therefore, Christianity is true.

Perhaps my argument, such as it is, is a variant of an argument that C. S. Lewis presents in Mere Christianity. According to Lewis, we should expect the unexpected.

Reality, in fact, is usually something you could not have guessed. That is one of the reasons I believe Christianity. It is a religion you could not have guessed. If it offered us just the kind of universe we had always expected, I should feel we were making it up. But, in fact, it is not the sort of thing anyone would have made up. It has just that queer twist about it that real things have.

So, there it is. It’s not an argument I’m about to write up and submit to a peer-reviewed academic journal any time soon, but hey. I’m only a jar of clay.

What is real?

The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. (NIV)

In what sense is the world “real”? What are we asking, when we ask that question?

Anna Salamon doesn’t know. I don’t know. Perhaps Jordan Peterson knows.

I’m going to talk to you today about a different way of looking at what real is.

It’s not easy to figure out what real is because we don’t really have infinite knowledge and so we’re always making some sets of presuppositions about what’s most real.

It really matters what you assume is most real because you base the decisions that you make, that run the entire course of your life, on those assumptions, whether you recognise it or not. And if you get the assumptions wrong, or even if you leave them incomplete, you’re going to pay a big price for it.

See also The Naturalist and the Supernaturalist.