Okay, say I confront someone on (e.g.) the uniformity of nature, and explained how I accounted for it (a sovereign, orderly, providential God), and asked him how he accounts for it, and he responds like this:

him - Well, how do you account for God?
me - He is my presupposition, my self-existent and self-attesting starting point.
him - Okay, well I believe uniformity is intrinsic to nature and that is my starting point.

How would you respond to that last point? If I told him that's not justifying uniformity at all but rather assuming it, how can I avoid the charge that I am merely assuming God?

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Ben Maas. . . . .Facebook
In college, attending First Presbyterian Church (PCUSA), Ada, OH, and
Belle Center Reformed Presbyterian Church (RPCNA), Belle Center, OH
When at home, attending Covenant Presbyterian Church (OPC), Mansfield, OH

“Prayer is as natural an expression of faith as breathing is of life.”
-Jonathan Edwards-

If uniformity is intrinsic in nature how does one account for those times when it's not uniform? For instance, how would this presupposition allow for babies born with deformities, crimes against nature, and the like.

The presupposition of God and the Bible allows for this by the fall into sin.

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Larry Bray
Elder - Reformed Presbyterian Church of Boothwyn, PCA
Boothwyn, PA - http://www.rpcb.org/
Free Online Reformed Seminary - http://www.tnars.net
-----------------------------------------------------
Christian ritual costs nothing and is worth nothing. True Christian religion costs all that we have and is worth everything.

I don't think babies with deformities or crimes against a moral law would constitute as breaks in the uniformity of nature. Only miracles would, really.

I would say to him "You haven't even given an answer." He's pretty much saying "Nature is uniform because that's what's nature is." He's giving no cause for the effect you guys are investigating. A presupposition is the starting point of the person's philosophy that cannot be evidentially proven. Uniformity can be proven evidentially.

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[B]Manley Beasley[/B]
Southern Baptist Convention
Fayetteville, Arkansas

[B]Wir sein pettler. Hoc est verum (We are beggars. This is true.).--Luther's dying words[/B]

I would point out that in that case he is taking a leap of faith. He just believes something without any evidence whatsoever.

This is most effective against atheists who raise the evidential objection to the faith, ie. "you ought not believe anything that does not rest upon evidence".

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Christoffer S.
Layman
Finnish Evangelical-Lutheran church
Vaasa, Finland

So what would you say if he claimed to simply presuppose uniformity? If I told him that was disallowed, then what would I say if he responded by saying that my presupposing God is disallowed? In other words, why could he not (legitimately) respond, "Well, you're just saying that God exists because that's what God is."

I think I'm really getting close to the answer I want here: clearly it is some sort of category error to classify uniformity of nature as a presupposition, but I don't know how to flesh this out.

I'm not sure you need to respond with an argument, Ben. That person is probably one of two types. First, he is just being degrading. He doesn't really presuppose the uniformity of nature; he just wants you to look dumb. He is pointing out your "fideism." At that point, I would probably just ask whether he really believed that or was playing with me.

The second type of person is a somewhat unreflective argumentative type. You've probably confused him, and now he is just latching on to something that struck him as plausible. This might be a time to gently remind him that that presupposition amounts to faith. He is probably trying to avoid faith, because he wants to be smarter than you.

Finally, you could ask either one to test his thesis. Even if uniformity of nature provided a basis for science, does it work for morality and logic? And, to use some creation science, can what we know of nature actually produce life from non-life? (I would say, don't underestimate the value of more traditional evidence, especially regarding creation. Countless people have come to Christ, starting with their "Knowledge of God the Creator" as Calvin would put it.)

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Charlie Johnson
Downtown Presbyterian Church (PCA)
Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, student

I don't think it is a problem at all if you allow him that presupposition. What he is saying is that "nature explains nature" in the same way that we believe "God explains God". The difference is that his presupposition does not provide an adequate base for making the presupposition of uniformity since uniformity is an immaterial law. Yours does. So his presupposition ends up defeating itself. The only ways out of this for him will be to change his presupposition to allow for immaterial laws or to show that uniformity is not an immaterial law, but rather a series of observations. If the former, he has to go beyond nature for a presupposition and you can see where that takes the discussion...if the latter, then what he has is an observation, not a presupposition...as Hume helped show an observation cannot be presupposed since it is subject to change. This is known as the problem of induction.

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Joel Batts
Christ Presbyterian Church (PCA) - Memphis, TN

I believe that many would find that the heart sings unbidden while they are working their way through a tough bit of theology with a pipe in their teeth and a pencil in their hand. - CS Lewis

Why would you need to challenge him about whether he has made a valid presupposition? As a presupposition, I suppose a person could start from any point they wanted. I would think that the needed response would be to point out that his presupposition is to reject the Word and truth of God (if that is in fact the point of this).

That is to say, I think it's important to argue presuppositions with people who don't know they're making them. The point is to make them see that they are in fact assuming something foundational, rather than reaching their conclusions striclty on "evidence" or "proof" (as they often claim). Once they concede that they have a presupposition, then you've made the choice before them clear: do they put their faith in the Gospel, or in nature or whatever it is? You really can't go any further than that.

Or am I missing something here?

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Louis DiBiase
Louisville, KY

Nature has been proven, per his materialistic worldview, to be un-uniform. Nature has not been a consistent over time and, according to all the evidence, the Universe is not self-existent, whether you hold to Big Bang Theory, Creationism, or any other theory.

Presupposition fails.

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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.

I think the answer is that the critique is valid and there is no silver bullet apologetic method.

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Davidius
Husband of Emily
Member of All Saints Anglican Church - Chapel Hill (AMiA / Anglican Church of North America)
Student: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, German and Classics

I ran into this a lot with atheists. This guy is begging the question...egregiously.

I believe your response should be simple as you're probably overthinking this: If he's an atheist, he has a presupposition of uniformity (ie. he trusts induction), and one of chaos (i.e. evolution...flies in the face of induction). Since these two positions cannot be harmonized, his assertion is illogical.

When I run into this I ask the person how he knows nature to be uniform. If he goes back to the 'intrinsic nature' argument I ask him how he knows the intrinsic nature of the universe. Generally his argument reduces to some form of, Nature was uniform in the past, so it will be uniform in the future. Or say, Ok, I'll give you that the intrinsic nature of the universe in the past was uniform, but how do you know that will be the case in the future? Either way he engages in begging the question. He can't base what he believes the nature of the universe to be in the future on what he believes the nature of the universe to have been in the past.

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Chris Thomas | SBC-Founders | Fairbanks, AK

"Whatever the cause, the Calvinists were the only fighting Protestants. It was they whose faith gave them courage to stand up for the Reformation. In England, Scotland, France, Holland, they,... did the work, and but for them the Reformation would have been crushed... If it had not been for Calvinists,... and whatever you like to call them, the Pope and Philip would have won, and we should either be Papists or Socialists." ~ Sir John Skelton

Hi:

I believe the above responses are good. There are a few more suggestions I would like to add:

1) Where can you prove to me that "nature is uniform"? Are the Dinosaurs still around? How do you account for the Ice Age? The Second Law of Thermodynamics?

and,

2) Laws are indicative of intelligence. By claiming that there is an intrinsic law in nature you are claiming that nature has some intelligence either to it (pantheism) or that some Intelligent Designer placed the laws there.

Consequently, your friend has not really answered the question.

Blessings,

Rob

__________________
In Essentials Unity, in non-Essentials Liberty, in all things Charity.

Robert Paul Wieland
Springs Reformed Presbyterian Church
Colorado Springs, CO RPCNA
Student at Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary, Pittsburgh PA
Never be afraid to do something new. Remember, amateurs built the Ark, but professionals built the Titanic.

He's not presupposing uniformity. Uniformity is something believed because of observation of empirical evidence and by definition cannot be a presupposition. Presuppositions can't be whatever we want them to be, they cannot be provable or disprovable empirically. His presupposition is actually that we come to truth through empirical observation. This is a self refuting presupposition because it is denying that there are presuppositions.

Since uniformity is an impersonal and unintelligent thing, it cannot account for moral values. Moral values come to us in the form of an imperative and an imperative can only be accounted for by something that is personal and that has a will.

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Curt Hayashida
member, Community Bible Church (Non-denominational)
Vallejo, CA

Yep, that's the answer!

I'm not sure I'd say embracing observation of empirical evidence is a denial of presuppositions...if someone embraces observation as a way of coming to a conclusion, he has presupposed uniformity (that's why he projects that into the future)...hence, his reasoning is fallaciously circular...add to that the conflicting assumption of chaos (i.e. evolution) then it's clear this guy is seriously out to lunch.

But you're definitely right...this guy is just saying whatever he wants and thinks that is the equivalent of presupposing the Christian God. Simply following up with a question with this guy by asking something like this: "How do you know nature is uniform?" will bring out the circularity of it all. Even if he were clever enough to say this is a necessary precondition for intelligibility, he hasn't accounted for this (as others have pointed out, nature is temporal, changing, and not as uniform as we often expect) nor will he have explained how this gels with a chaos theory of origins.

Sorry I didn't state that clearly. When I said "His presupposition is actually that we come to truth through empirical observation", it would have been better if I said, "His presupposition is actually that the only way we come to truth is through empirical observation." That's what I meant. I certainly believe we can come to know things through scientific method but to say scientific method is the only/foundational way to know truth is self refuting. That's why Logical Positivism has lost its place as a respectable philosophy.

The uniformity of nature is not achieved through observation, it is presupposed in observation (and science). Besides that, it seems to me, hearing all this news of the confusing finds in quantum mechanics, that the universe is not so uniform actually.

I think it is a valid rebuttal, and one of the problems I have with strict presuppositionalism (as I call it; basically, the TAG).

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Steven Nemes
Phoenix, AZ

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

What have you heard come out of quantum mechanics?

Stuff like particles randomly appearing en masse in the universe, a single particle hitting two different targets at the same time, information being sent from one particle to another at great distances, subatomic particles that imitate and take the form of whatever particles they are put next to... It makes no sense, any of that stuff, to me because I don't know how they find any of that stuff out. No one has even seen an atom and much of the supposed structure of an atom is simply guesswork from some scientists, and yet they find particles doing absurd things all the time in strange places in the universe...

Please explain.

How is question begging a valid rebuttal?

Why not presuppose logic, morality, and science? Why posit God?

If you don't have to prove God's existence but simply act on it being presupposed, then why bother proving nature is uniform or objective morality exists? Why not just assume it and work from there?

How is presupposing the uniformity of nature begging the question?

I think I have come to a fitting conclusion from this, and it's what I call the "floating pillars" fallacy.

There are certain things about experience which must be true for knowledge to exist, such as the reliability of sense perception, the uniformity of nature, the existence of logic, the existence of truth, the existence of morality (although some atheists might dispute with this), etc. These are pillars which are necessary for a worldview.

If someone honestly wanted to presuppose one of these and declare that to be his presupposition, then that would be legitimate -- until he realized that such a presupposition does not entail a whole worldview, but merely one part (and an extremely small part at that!). If he wanted to just declare all the pillars as presuppositions, then he has no logical connection or basis undergirding these pillars and therefore he would be positing "floating pillars," hence the name of the fallacy.

The history of philosophy has attempted to provide a systematic solution to this, trying to find a way to tie together these pillars (among other things ) into one schema. It is entirely insufficient and unreasonable to assert that the pillars have a basis without specifying what that basis is.

For the Christian (and for any sensible philosopher), the basis is the God of Scripture.

[This is, by the way, the problem I have with Objectivism, as it equates from the need to believe things (e.g. sensory reliability) to their rational justification, i.e., the "floating pillars" fallacy.]

Why not just make those "pillars" the basis? One super-basis...

Your fallacy begs the question because they're not holding those things as pillars when they presuppose them--they make them the basis of other "pillars" which might be science, etc.

-----Added 2/13/2009 at 05:01:09 EST-----

And why should a worldview have to have those things?

The pillars themselves can't be the basis, for atomistically asserting several parts which do not logically imply or support each other to actually be logically implying or supporting each other is illogical.

I'm not sure what this means. I realize that other things can be built off of these basic pillars, but it doesn't follow that the pillars are self-existing or that they do not need a coherent basis.

Everyone has to believe them. All the things I listed are impossible to disbelieve in practice, and some are impossible to disbelieve in language. Consequently, they must be included in the worldview.

Your last question actually prompted me to copy down something I wrote down a month or so ago. Check out this thread.

Maybe you don't understand what I was saying. Why not make the basis of your world view, among other things, the reliability of the senses?

Again why not make them the basis rather than a pillar?

Go ahead. That's empiricism, and it has its problems. What one can't do is grab a bunch of different "presuppositions" and claim that he just presupposes them all.

Because, categorically speaking, they cannot be that. A basis cannot be "these are logically connected because I say so."

FYI, presuppers don't argue on the basis of: "You know what? I'm going to just assume God. No need to argue!"

What makes scripture a presupposition and all those things necessary for a worldview not?

I never said that...

What's the intrinsic characteristic of nature in the future? Uniformity? If so, how do you know this?

Several have stated something akin to what I'm going to post, but I want to add just a little of math and the fundamentals of logic to the mix.

Presuppositions are those thing that one takes as true without proof. They can be from having observed things and then assumed true, and they become the starting point for all other thought.

While Christians have an externally imposed presuppositional system imposed upon them from "outside" (i.e., the Spirit illuminating the word to the heart so the sinner is regenerated, convicted of sin, repents, turns to Christ and trusts him for salvation and life) we still have a presuppositional system. It cannot be proven in the sense of taking evidence and showing it is true.

Other presuppositional systems exist, but they are inherently false (the only world that can exist is the world that God created -- thanks CVT!). But within that world we learn that those that reject it do so despite the evidence to the contrary (Rom 1:18 and following ... for the next 9 chapters! ). Regardless of what we want to do, you cannot argue a person into believing. Don't try. Understand that if someone is extreme in their antagonism they aren't going to change in a day. The best argument would be to live a righteous life before them which points them to Christ.

__________________
Brian Withnell
Deacon, OPC
Leesburg, Virginia

You cannot train for war in the midst of a battle. Prepare before the battle starts; if the battle is long and hard, you will wish you had.

Perhaps I am misunderstanding this statement of yours:

Well I imagine a typical presuppositionalist conversation (and I've had a few myself) runs something like this:

Johnny Presup: How do you explain the fact that nature is uniform, that objective moral imperatives exist, and that the laws of logic exist and the universe operates according to them, according to your atheism?
Max Atheist: I don't know, how do you explain them?
Johnny Presup: Well I presuppose the existence of God, and those things are merely consequences of that presupposition.


Why not...

Max Atheist: I just presuppose the uniformity of nature and the laws of logic and objective moral values, that's why I can engage in scientific inquiry and write philosophy papers and go to political protests.

As I said, this is a category error. Presupposing the proposition "science is intelligible" does not make science is intelligible, for you have to explain how it is. Not any proposition can be a presupposition. For instance:

Presupper -- Given my worldview, which presupposes God as the ultimate transcendent authority, I can make sense of science, for I have a good reason to believe that nature is uniform [because of a sovereign and immutable God who controls all of nature uniformly], that an objective universe exists [because a single God actually created it, per Gen. 1], that our senses our reliable [because they were created by a trustworthy God], etc. Scripture tells me all this.

Atheist -- Well, I just presuppose all those things by themselves without invoking God.

Presupper -- Those propositions which you are claiming to presuppose are corollaries of other propositions, and consequently they are provable or disprovable [since they can either be implied by something else or not]; therefore, they cannot be presuppositions, since presuppositions by definition cannot be proven or disproven by some other proposition other than themselves. Moreover, those propositions do not logically imply each other (e.g., "Nature is uniform" does not logically entail "Moral values exist"), and therefore each of those propositions cannot be a presupposition, lest you want to have several worldviews, all of which are incomplete. This is absurd. [That is the "floating pillars" fallacy.]

Atheist -- Well, why does God count as a presupposition, then? I have seen several disproofs of Him.

Presupper -- Some arguments attempt to disprove an immanent god, different from the God of the Bible. Such arguments try to show evidence of evolution which contradicts Genesis, but that only works because of a pre-established materialistic consistency. The only arguments which are not prima facie illegitimate are ones which attempt to disprove God by positing a logical inconsistency in Him (e.g. this), and that is because God is transcendent. Therefore, in order to have a true presupposition, you must have one which can only be destroyed from the inside.

Atheist -- Alright, sign me up.



By the way, the last response of the presuppositionalist is not at all inconsistent with the other article I provided ("The Necessity of External Consistency in Apologetics"), for I am not positing external consistency with some "neutral" facts which we acquire apart from our presuppositions. Rather, what I am positing is some undeniable facts which simply cannot be disbelieved (surely by God's common grace/providential benevolence), and therefore which are necessarily contained within a presupposition. Thus, the "undeniable facts" which I spoke about are not facts by themselves which we start with and then work our way towards a presupposition -- that is not the method at all -- rather, these facts are so undeniable that whatever worldview we have must include such facts as part of it, and that is how we point we out internal inconsistencies.

Well I don't know about your definition of a presupposition--what could an atheist or a Buddhist or a Jew possibly hold as a presupposition?

If the atheist were an empiricist, he could start with everything he sees and use that as his starting point (i.e., his ultimate starting point) of information. IOW, his presupposition is simply perception.

A Buddhist and Jew could both start with their own holy texts, although both of them would probably hold an atheistic presupposition, such as empiricism (many Christians do this too, such as evidentialists, albeit inconsistently). If a Jew were to presuppose the Torah, the conversation would immediately become theological rather than purely philosophical as we show him the natural implication of Christianity which arises from consistent Judaism.