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Old 11-17-2007, 10:31 PM
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Jim_Johnston Jim_Johnston is offline.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Vytautas View Post

Again, why is self-identity important? Why must I know who am I in order to have knowledge? Scripturalism or Clarkianism is an idea not an idenity. Let’s see if the idea is true.
Again, and for the last time, I'm not talking about self-identity.

But, here's how it is important. Say some person S says that all knowledge is obtained in some specific way W. Then for some item of knowledge P, if S says that he knows P, but P was not obtained by W, then S rebuts W. Showing how someone can't live up to their critieria, or holds contradictory beliefs because of their position, is important, I'd say.

Quote:
You are right, the words are not there. I just copied down the verses that a Scripturalist gave in favor of his position. Perhaps we can look at some of the verses to see if the idea of Clarkianism is there.
And that should have told you all you need to know about their face-saving, ad hoc, contrived and forced position. Talk about grasping at straws.

Quote:
Men cannot fathom or find out the work God has done from beginning to end. The verse shows that man cannot obtain knowledge of the works of God which are creation and providence. So man cannot know anything of God’s world that he made. This undercuts all claims to knowledge unless God reveals knowledge to us.
For starters, "knowledge" isn't even a word in the verse. Secondly, is the context of Ecc. 3:10-11 to teach epistemology? To "undercut all claims to knowledge?" Why can't man "obtain knowledge of the works of God which are creation and providence." It seems that v. 14 indicates the opposite in that "God does it so that men will revere him." The text doesn't talk about "not knowing unless God reveals it to us." Where is that *in the text.*

Quote:
You are right; from this single verse you cannot deduce the universal statement. But from the verse we can gather that the way in which Peter got his knowledge was by revelation from God. It would seem that for us to know that Jesus is the Christ, God must reveal this to us as well. Jesus did not say to Peter, you got to your conclusion by empirical observation or by deducing it from non-scriptural premises or by a wild guess. Now do you believe that this verse is for us as well so that there is an application?
Then why'd they use it as a proof text for a universal statement?

For us to know that Jesus is the Christ that must be revealed, okay. So what follows? Nothing that supports Scripturalism.

Next, how does the Scripturalist know that Jesus didn't say those things? Why believe that? Is he trusting his senses? Can he "deduce" that Jesus didn't say that?

Quote:
Note that I believe we can obtain knowledge from experience and deducing things from non-scriptural premises. I am just arguing what I think a Scriptualist might say, since I think there is some truth to their position, just not in their traditional formulations that I have looked at.

"Some truth" is pretty vague. There's "some truth" in Quine's position. So what? Anyway, I don't feel it a wise use of time to debate a weak position with someone trying to defend that position even though he disagrees with that position. You think it's false. Nothing you've said rebuts my point that the Scripturalists don't know that they are Scripturalists. I was just wondering why they voted that way.
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