“God is Missing”

(Nietzsche Had it Right)

An Endearing Story

Two little boys, ages 8 and 10, are excessively mischievous. They are always getting into trouble and their parents know if any mischief occurs in their town, the two boys are probably involved.

The boys' mother heard that a preacher in town had been successful in disciplining children, so she asked if he would speak with her boys.  The preacher agreed, but he asked to see them individually.

The mother sent the 8 year old in the morning, with the older boy to see the preacher in the afternoon. 

The preacher, a huge man with a deep booming voice, sat the younger boy down and asked him sternly, "Do you know where God is, son?"  The boy's mouth dropped open, but he made no response, sitting there wide-eyed with his mouth hanging open.

So the preacher repeated the question in an even sterner tone, "Where is God?! Again, the boy made no attempt to answer.

The preacher raised his voice even more and shook his finger in the boy's face and bellowed, "WHERE IS GOD?!"

The boy screamed and bolted from the room, ran directly home and dove into his closet, slamming the door behind him.  When his older brother found him in the closet, he asked, "What happened?"

The younger brother, gasping for breath, replied, "We are in BIG trouble this time!"  "GOD is missing, and they think WE did it!"

A Serious Truth

The reality of the matter is that God is missing and WE did do it!

The simple truth is this.  Religious ideas have lost their social significance in western culture.  Thus secularization has become the norm but not just any secularization.  It is a rather proactive even aggressive secularization!

Within Western Culture, when the individual chooses to hold some belief or another that is not agreeable to the culture, then something very interesting but very tragic happens.  More and more that culture seeks to stamp its standards upon that individual in an attempt to mold him into the cultural norm of naturalism and thus secularism. 

At one time religion had a seat at the table and a place in public discourse.  Now it is relegated to eating in the kitchen.  At one time ethical truth was that which was foundational to one’s life and the functions within the group.  It served stabilized however with secularization such is no longer so.  Even the likes of Friedrich Nietzsche, though he sought to decimate Christian belief and compromise ethical thinking recognized that the outcomes of such thinking would be dire.

 “The greatest recent event – that ‘God is dead,’ that the belief in the Christian God has become unbelievable – is already beginning to cast its first shadows. . . . But in the main one may say: The event itself is far too great, too distant, too remote from the multitude’s capacity for comprehension. . . . Much less may one suppose that many people know as yet what this event really means – and how much must collapse now that this faith has been undermined because it was built upon this faith, propped up by it, grown into it; for example, the whole of our . . . morality. . . .”

Nietzsche, in Gay Science at http://philossophy.wordpress.com/

category/philosophy/nietzsche/

Friedrich Nietzsche was right, and even during his lifetime he could see that without there being the influence of the Christian God, the shadows of moral degradation and missing civility were beginning to be cast over Western Culture.  It is interesting to note that Nietzsche spent the last of his years insane and silent.  The only time he broke that silence was to quote the Scriptures he had learned as a young boy.

“The Preponderance of Faith”

“The Preponderance of Faith”

Perhaps you've heard the statement "preponderance of the evidence."  The point of the following is that without 100% proof, there is a gap that is only filled by faith.  Thus, from the cold empiricist to the existentialist, faith is to be found in any and all systems of knowledge.

George H. Smith[1] in his book, Atheism: The Case Against God and writing of The Skepticism of Faith argues that skepticism in the study of the origins of knowledge will eventually lend aid and comfort to religious claims and turn against the atheist.  Quite a claim for a libertarian atheist.

The point is this.  For the one who is skeptical of the theist and who asserts that his claims of reality cannot be proven in total, then he is simply observing what is true of any and all roads to reality.  Both sides of the atheism-theism question to some degree must rely, not on the facts but upon his belief.  To rely upon one’s belief is to put trust in that belief—that is put faith in that belief.

Just to be clear, since atheism cannot be reliably proven, then such requires some degree of belief beyond what proof that may exist for the claim.  Therefore one can conclude that atheism requires faith.  So while the atheist points to the theist and joyfully demands proof, what he fails to see is that his own position is equally fragile.  Fragile because it cannot be completely and totally substantiated.

This holds true for the Rationalist, as there are matters that cannot be discerned through one’s thinking no matter how much intellectual prowess one might posses.  As well it holds true for the Empiricist for there are matters that cannot be scientifically proven nor explained no matter how much science is applied to the question.

Whether it be Naturalism, Idealism, Materialism, Existentialism, or any of a number of other “isms” it is as it is in theism.  There simply is no iron clad, 100% verifiable way in which to prove the veracity of any of the aforementioned systems and any others that you might care to include in the discussion. 

The simple point is that without some degree of trust/faith, one cannot legitimately embrace any truth system.  So then, how does one comes to believe in this idea or that notion?  In its simple form, it is a matter of one’s choice.   What then do you choose to believe?

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[1] Author, editor, and contributor to numerous publications is an atheist and libertarian thinker.

"Christianity - Does it Depreciate the Natural World?"

Christians Depreciating the Natural Word

Although this is the title of the article (see background below), there is a break down between the title and the article.  What the article really postulates is that because of the Christian’s belief that there is a future beyond this life, they have little concern about the natural world.

Of course even a cursory view of the history of scientific study, inquiry, and discovery will reveal a very different story.  The reality is that with the coming of the Protestant Reformation and the Roman Catholic Counter Reformation, the theological groundwork was laid for there to be magnificent scientific discoveries. (See articles at http://alviesthots.blogspot.com/2012/11/christianity-is-it-opposed-to-science.html along with two accompanying articles).  

Truth of the Matter

In sum, the truth of the matter, genuine Christians deprecate the world as presented by the naturalist who presents either a less than complete verifiable scientific narrative or an unverifiable scientific narrative born of bias.  Because genuine Christians give truth an unequalled priority, they indeed cannot be comfortable with the secular naturalists views of the science.

Generalizations Abound

Those who hold this position must resort to anecdotal example and generalization to make the point.  The reality is that any argument that relies heavily upon these two sources for information is certainly to be suspect.  Even if the conclusion were true, the lack of factual data and the innuendo discredit the notion and especially so in this case.  Of course such characterizes much of the material that this and other postings call into question.

Fact Check

The problem with the anecdotal evidence presented in this argument is that the writer is presenting out of bias and not out of fact.  For example he wrongly attributes a quote to former Interior Secretary James Watt which if he would have fact checked would reveal it was wrongly attributed to him (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1339686/posts).  As well the fact that there are Christians who are involved, rightly or wrongly, in the environmental movement is not mentioned.  Such is the behavior of one who writes out of bias and not fact.

Reality, Science, and Theoretical Conjecture

There is a basic process to be considered.  One becomes more and more convinced of that with which one feeds one’s minds.  That is to say if one fills their thinking with the theoretical it soon becomes reality. 

The problem that the secularist brings to the science table is that they are so filled with the notions of secular naturalism that they cannot see other possibilities for reality.  Consider the following quote.

Dinesh D’Souza in a debate with Christopher Hitchens regarding the notion that everything has a cause observes, “…In the weird world of the quantum, we can find exceptions to that rule.  But quantum effects cancel out when you come to macroscopic objects and whenever you hear someone say ‘consciousness I really don’t know what that is but perhaps it is a quantum thing’ what he is basically saying is that he does not know.  …The quantum is invoked to explain things that are unexplained.” (see debate at  www.youtube.com/watch?v=9V85OykSDT8&feature=g-hist).

Such suggests that there are dead ends in naturalism.

Dead End Science

The point is that because genuine science constantly runs into naturalistic dead ends they have created a whole field of theoretical conjecture to include quantum physics, theoretical mathematics, etc.  Sometimes it is just plan difficult to do science in a closed system scenario when there are constant signs pointing to the fact that genuine science must include. 

The whole area of first causes is an example of such a scientific dead end.  The question that mystifies secular science is what precipitated the “Big Bang?”   Since it is not possible to postulate that nature big banged nature into existence and since it is an inconvenient truth to acknowledge the supernatural, science then resorts to quantum physics in which there is much speculation and theoretical conjecture.

Biases Exposed

The reality is that most of what passes for secular science today is an atheist bias or philosophy which then calls upon other more empirical studies to support the position.  This is not science, this is simply bias which grasps at science, physics, mathematics, etc. for support.  Of course genuine science cannot provide such support so we arrive back at the theoretical.

Faith in Fact or Theory

Now before one runs to the conclusion that one places faith in God, Religion, and Creation as a fact, consider the following.

Not one person alive today was there when it all began.  So no one really knows for sure so the prudent person is left with a choice.  It is as follows.  Should one place their faith in a closed system theory which constantly leads to dead ends or should one place their faith in an open system theory that answers many of the questions posed by the previous theory?

Should one place their faith in a closed system that is founded more upon the mores of a particular social system that proposes relative, secular, humanistic truth or in an open system that postulates transcendent, universal, and objective truth?  While one can make that choice the outcomes of that choice are beyond one’s control and should be considered very carefully.

Background

To see the list of subjects to be discussed in this series see my blog (Christianity – Is it a Faith Driven by Fear? http://alviesthots.blogspot.com/2012/11/christianity-is-it-faith-driven-by-fear.html).  Contained within that blog is a reference, 20 Reasons to Abandon Christianity and in that reference is a list which is the springboard from which this subject has been discussed.