How would you guys handle this?

CA601: Evolution and naturalism

__________________
Jonathan
College Student
Grace Family Fellowship {SBC}
Kentucky

... yet for us there is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we for Him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and through whom we live.

1 Corinthians 8:6

I would note that everything he just posited is, according to his presuppositions and worldview, a product of random chance and thereby, neither objective or trustworthy. I would then proceed to tell him that he is not the final arbiter and determiner of what is truth and what is objective.

__________________
Josh Hicks, Chloë's Dad
Christ Covenant Reformed Presbyterian Church, RPCGA
Facebook - The Calvinist Vent
Board Rules - Signature Rules - Suggestion Box

It is God that multiplies our sorrows.... God, as a righteous Judge, does it, which ought to silence us under all our sorrows; as many as they are, we have deserved them all, and more: nay, God, as a tender Father, does it for our necessary correction, that we may be humbled for sin, and weaned from the world by all our sorrows; and the good we get by them, with the comfort we have under them, will abundantly balance our sorrows, how greatly soever they are multiplied. - Matthew Henry

__________________
Benjamin P. Glaser, M. Div, Licentiate, Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church
Member Fairmount ARP Church
Pittsburgh, PA

Deo Vindice

This is your best answer to the problem. Macroevolution is an untestable hypothesis that can be asserted but never supported--it takes too long to occur! So, it must be removed from scientific consideration.

__________________
Jonathan
Audio Engineer
Reformed Anabaptist
Ohio

Moroni's magical glasses of proper interpretation:

What if he is a theistic evolutionist?

Then he has capitulated to so-called Science in direct contradiction of God's holy, perfect, and inspired Word. He has trusted his fallen senses and skewed logic over and against the sure Word of Truth that can only proceed from the thrice holy God of Scripture.

Rebuttal of Response #1: Nature is the only objective standard we have because of the adoption of Naturalism. Naturalism assumes from the outset that all must be proven by physical, natural means. The only things that may be proven by physical, natural means are those things that are physical and natural. Ergo, the only objective standard under the Naturalistic worldview is determined by assuming the conclusion, a logical fallacy.

Rebuttal of Response #2: Evolution does rule out the possibility of divine influence because divine influence is a supernatural occurrence. If Response #1 is true, and in evolution it is assumed as true, then all supernatural explanations are rejected at a presuppositional level because the only acceptable evidence under Naturalism is natural, not supernatural.

Rebuttal of Response #3: Evolution seeks to explain our origins by naturalistic means, effectively ruling out any possibility of supernatural causes. Meteorology, farming, printing, law, etc. do not seek to explain our origins.

Moreover, we would not have to throw out those areas if we discard naturalism because discarding naturalism is merely denouncing the assertion that physical processes are the only way to explain something. Under a supernatural explanation of what we understand, we recognize that natural explanations are one of two ways we understand things to occur.

Even more so, Law, based on our understanding of morality, is traditionally rooted in supernatural presuppositions. The author is apparently not familiar with the English or American legal systems at all. Law's roots emphatically reject naturalism, and so do most laws today.

Rebuttal of Response #4: That spirituality is irrational. If all we can prove is physical and natural, there is no reason to assume the supernatural which cannot be proven under the needlessly strict and circularly illogical demands of Naturalism.

__________________
Andrew DeShazo
Husband of Kathryn
Father of Phillip-Giles B. DeShazo
Deacon
Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, Memphis, TN
"From out of the depth of unbroken Infinfity arose the Question, "Who am I?" And to that Question there is the answer, "I am God!" -Meher Baba, died 1969.

"I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." Christ, died 33 AD, ressurected three days later.

Is it possible for someone to neither presuppose the existence of or non-existence of God? I believe many evolutionists take this stance. The problem with this is that it seems to give the evolutionist “wiggle room.” You know, the creationist may be right; there might actually be a God who created, through evolution. All we can know is that evolution happened.

I’m not quite sure how to handle this argument.

According to Romans 1 it is impossible to NOT presuppose the non existence of God.

__________________
Bob Vigneault C.O.L, L.E., G.E, Dr.O.P., O.U.T.
The Heartbeat of Heaven (blog)
Deacon/Christ Presbyterian Church, Janesville, WI OPC www.christ-opc.org

Click to get: Board Rules -- Signature Requirements -- Suggestions?

I wouldn't even agree with the creationist's claim; who cares about their response to it?

__________________
Steven Nemes
Phoenix, AZ

Good philosophy must exist, if for no other reason, because bad philosophy must be answered - C.S. Lewis

Talkorigins is not noted for their dispassionate promotion of science, rather more for skewing and misstating things so that science appears to support atheism.

As for answering some of the points in there, here goes:

Here is one example that clearly shows their presupposition. I guess on one level it is true in that every person observes the same data, however, what is implied here is that the data, according to methodological naturalism, has to be ascribed to natural causes alone. As Christians we do not disagree as far as secondary causes go, but then the following qualifier, nature as "the only objective standard", shows that they consider nature to be the primary cause. That is a serious leap of faith, because for that be true, the observable universe (nature) would have had to cause itself.

Who or what decides what support constitutes? Is quantum physics science or not? Cosmology? Archeology? The stock answer here is that anything that can be subjected to the scientific method and methodological naturalism is scientific. That raises more questions than answers though. Basically any human undertaking can be described using the scientific method (Christian Skepticism - a reasonable faith...: I'm a Golfologist. Not only that, both of those assumptions are philosophical in nature, and cannot be proven by their own assumptions, i.e. prove the scientific method by using the scientific method, or show how methodological naturalism has been "reliably observed" in nature.

#3 is a blind assertion that does not distinguish between primary and secondary causes. It can only be stated that way if naturalism is dictated a-priori. It is also a straw-man argument brought up many times by atheists, as it assumes that Christians believe all things are supernaturally caused. It exhibits no knowledge of the regularity of natural laws that God instituted from creation forward. They may then argue that God serves no purpose in describing these things, but that fails to account for those aspects they hold by faith, such as the reliability of their observations, the expectation of regularity in nature, the reason that the universe behaves in a regulated and consistent fashion etc.

Pot calling kettle?

I hope that helps. There is plenty more to repsond to there, but those were the main points I would address.

__________________
John Steyn
Redeemer Presbytarian Church, PCA
Frisco, TX

http://omnipotentgrace.wordpress.com/

I think the simplest response would be the one I mentioned earlier--macroevolution doesn't stand up to the criticisms applied to divine intervention. By their own reasoning, then, we should reject it as unscientific.