Dr Greg Bahnsen - Bahnsen-Stein Debate: Does God Exist? (Part 1)

This recording has been released into the public domain by the Bonson Institute, where.

We aim to bring into captivity every.

Thought to the obedience of Christ.

This is the great debate.

Does God exist? My name is Ben Hulman. I direct the program of speech and debate here at the University of California, Irvine. I want to welcome you here this evening on behalf of the speech and Debate team.

Like many of you, I don't think.

That Time magazine fully exhausted this question a couple of years ago in its cover article. And so we're here to ask the question again. And to begin, I'd not like to be inappropriate and offer an invocation, but instead I'd like to point to you the sponsor of tonight's debate, and that is the UCI Speech and Debate team, nationally ranked, 21st in the country. And I'd also like to introduce to you a member of that speech and debate team himself, a nationally ranked speaker and the team's president and our moderator this evening, David Agopium.

Thank you. I, too, would like to welcome each and every one of you to this evening's debate. I hope you excuse my somewhat congested tone, but these kinds of viruses usually occur when you spend hundreds of hours and many late nights planning great debates. So if I happen to sneeze during tonight, I would ask you that in light of tonight's topic, you'd think twice about saying, God bless you. Seriously, though, I would ask for your cooperation tonight in making my job much easier by demonstrating the utmost courtesy and respect for both speakers. We have two highly abled scholars with us this evening to debate the issues better than any of us ever might imagine to do. I would ask, therefore, that you would refrain from any applause during the course of the debate. The basic reason for that being tonight's debate is strictly time. Once the time segment begins, the time clock continues to run until it has expired. In other words, when you applaud, you're only taking away the time your speaker has to communicate his particular viewpoint here this evening. I would also ask, in addition to refraining from applause, that you would also refrain from flash bulbs if you have any flash cameras with you here this evening. And the final note of my stern disciplinarian attitude this evening, I would ask that you would also refrain from any external verbal participation here this evening. That's a speech and debate way of saying, we'd ask you if you'd please allow the scholars to do the debating. We do have CSO officers here and former university football players who will. They'd be happy to exert their influence shall we say, and escort you to the door? But we would seriously ask for your cooperation in that. Allow me now to explain the logistics of the mechanics that we're going to follow in this evening's debate. And the debate format, very briefly, is a hybrid debate format. It's not as strenuous or rigid as the presidential debate as you saw earlier this year. And it's not as strenuous as the intercollegiate debate patterns this evening's debate. If you'd open up your program and look on the left hand page, you'll find the exact format that we will be employing here tonight. This evening's debate is divided up into four major segments. Segments numbered one through three will comprise the main debate. Segment number four will be a question and answer period. Segment number one will begin with two 15 minute opening statements presented by each speaker. After those opening statements are presented, we will also have a period of cross examination. Now, in debate theory, cross examination is basically an opportunity for each opponent to interrogate or pose questions, or cross examine his opponent for logical fallacies, et cetera. It can also be used as a means of pointing out points of clarification. After cross examination is completed, we will then have two eight minute rebuttals and that will conclude segment number one. We'll then begin segment number two, which is exactly the same format as segment number one, with two exceptions. The speaking order, as you notice, will be inverted and shorter time increments will be employed. And that will take us all the way up to segment number three, which will simply be two 10 minute closing statements. After segment number three is concluded, this is my most important announcement. We will be handling questions and answers. As you can see, there are no floor microphones and it's a pretty good thing given the difficulty in access to the floors here this evening. So what we have planned to do is to handle questions and answers vis a vis written format. Each of you had included in your evening program a blank sheet of paper. We would ask that if a question comes to your mind during the course of the debate, that that question will be recorded on that piece of paper. If you so desire to possibly have that question answered at the conclusion of segment number three, our speech and debate team ushers will quickly promptly enter the aisles to collect those questions from you, fighting over the people seated in the aisles. And they will then be delivered over to our question panelists. They will be sorted through rather quickly, and then we will have three questions for either speaker, depending on the time that we have left with us here this evening. Having explained the logistics of the debate. I'd like to introduce to you this evening's speakers. Please give a Warm welcome to Dr. Gordon Stein and Dr. Greg Vonson. Like to introduce each speaker to you now, let you know a little bit more about their biographical background. Dr. Greg Bonson holds the Master of Divinity and the Master of Theology from Westminster Theological Seminary, as well as a PhD in Philosophy from the University of Southern California. He has fulfilled professorships at Reformed Theological Seminary in Jackson, Mississippi and at Ashland Theological Seminary in Ohio. He is a member of the Evangelical Theological Society, the Society of Christian Philosophers, the American Philosophical Society, as well as an Advisory Board member of the International Council on biblical inerrancy. Dr. Bonson has published numerous articles on apologetics, ethics and Christian theology, as well as four scholarly books. Dr. Bonson is currently the Pastor of Covenant Community Church located in Placentia, California and resides in the Orange county area with his wife Kathy and his four children. Debating Dr. Bonson this evening will be Dr. Gordon Stein. Dr. Gordon Stein received a PhD from Ohio State University. He has established himself as one of America's foremost scholars of atheism. He is currently the President of the American Rationalist Federation, President of the Free Thought association, member of the Board of Directors of the North American Committee for Humanism, Vice President Pacific of the Freedom from Religion foundation, and Vice President of Atheists United. Dr. Stein has authored five leading books, two pamphlets, one of which, by the way, is entitled how to Argue with a Theist and Win, as well as several scholarly articles. He is also the editor of the American Rationalist Journal and the Associate Editor of Free Inquiry Magazine. Having introduced both speakers to you, we will now begin this evening's debate. The resolution before us is in the form of an interrogative a question. Does God exist? Dr. Bonson, I'll now ask for your 15 minute opening statement, please.

Thank you, David. I want to begin this evening with three opening and introductory remarks about the nature of the debate itself. First of all, it's necessary at the outset of our debate to define our terms. That's always the case. And in particular here I should make it clear what I mean when I use the term. I want to specify that I'm arguing particularly in favor of Christian theism and for it as a unit or system of thought and not for anything like theism in general. And there are reasons for that. Three, the various conceptions of deity found in the world religions are in most cases logically incompatible, leaving no unambiguous sense to general theism, whatever that might be. Secondly, I have not found the non Christian religions to be philosophically defensible, each of them being internally incoherent or undermining human reason and experience. And thirdly, since I am, by the grace of God, a Christian, I cannot from the heart adequately defend those religious faiths with which I disagree. My commitment is to the triune God and Christian worldview based on God's revelation in the Old and New Testaments. So first, then I'm defending Christian theism. Secondly, I want to observe, and we should indicate just what it is and is not at issue in the debate, on the basis of which we hope you'll consider the debate. It must be made clear that we are debating about philosophical systems, not the people who adhere to or profess them. Our concern is with the objective merits of the case, which can be made for atheism or Christian theism, not related subjective or personal matters. And again, I have three reasons or illustrations of this. The personalities of those individuals who adhere to different systems of thought are not really relevant to the truth or falsity of the claims made by those systems. Atheists and Christians can equally be found emotional, unlearned, intolerant or rude in their approaches. Secondly, subjective claims made about the experience of inner satisfaction or peace, claims that are made interestingly by both Christians and atheists in their literature and promotional claims made about the superiority of Christianity or atheism. For instance, some atheist literature suggests a greater mental health comes through the independence of the atheist outlook. These sorts of things are always subject to conflicting interpretations and explanations, being, I think, more autobiographical, rather than telling us anything for sure about the truth of the system under consideration. Thirdly, the issue is not whether atheists or professing Christians have ever done anything undesirable or morally unacceptable. One need only think respectively of the atheist involvement in the Reign of Terror in the French Revolution and the professing Christian involvement in the Spanish Inquisition. Now the question is not whether adherents of these systems have lived spotless lives, but whether atheism or Christian theism as philosophical systems are objectively true. And so I'll be defending Christian theism, and I'll be defending it as a philosophical system. My last introductory remark is simply to the effect that I want to concede to my opponent all issues pertaining to the control of ovarian maturation in Japanese quail, the subject of his doctoral dissertation in 1974 at Ohio State. Dr. Dr. Stein is a man of intelligence, and that's not in question in this debate. I would not pretend to hold my own in a discussion with him of the empirical details of his narrow domain of specialized natural science. However, our subject tonight is really much different, calling for intelligent reflection upon issues which are philosophical or theological in character. For some reason, Dr. Stein has over the last decade left his field of expertise and given his life to a campaign for atheism. Whatever his perception of the reason for that, I do not believe that it is because of any genuinely cogent philosophical case which might be made for atheism as a worldview. And it's to this subject which I now turn for tonight's debate. My opening case for the existence of God will cover three areas of thought. They are the nature of evidence, the presuppositional conflict of worldviews, and finally, the transcendental argument for God's existence. First of all, the nature of evidence. How should the difference of opinion between the theist and the atheist be rationally resolved? What Dr. Stein has written indicates that he, like many atheists, is not reflected adequately on this question. He writes, and I quote, the question of the existence of God is a factual question and should be answered in the same way as any other factual question. The assumption that all existence claims are questions about matters of fact, the assumption that these are all answered in the very same way is not merely oversimplified and misleading, it is simply mistaken. The existence, factuality, or reality of different kinds of things is not established or disconfirmed. And in the same way, in every case, we might ask, is there a box of crackers in the pantry? And we know how we would go about answering that question. But that is a far, far cry from the way we go about answering a question and determining the reality of, say, barometric pressure, quasars, gravitational attraction, elasticity, radioactivity, natural laws, names, grammar, numbers, the university itself that you're now at past events, categories, future contingencies, laws of thought, political obligations, individual identity, over time, causation, memories, dreams, or even love or beauty. In such cases, one does not do anything like walking to the pantry and looking inside for the crackers. There are thousands of existence or factual questions, and they are not at all answered in the same way in each case. Just think of the differences in argumentation and types of evidence used by biologists, grammarians, physicists, mathematicians, lawyers, logicians, mechanics, merchants and artists. It should be obvious that the type of evidence which one looks for in existence or factual claims will be determined by the field of discussion and especially by the metaphysical nature of the entity mentioned in the claim under question. Dr. Steins remarked that the existence of God, the Question of the existence of God is answered in the same way as any other factual question mistakenly reduces the theistic question to the same level as a box of crackers in the pantry, which we will hereafter call the crackers in the pantry fallacy. Secondly, then, I'd like to about the presuppositional conflict of worldviews. Dr. Stein has written about the nature of evidence in the theistic debate, and what he has said points to a second philosophical error of significant proportions. In passing, we would note how unclear he is by the way in speaking of the evidence which must be used, describing it variously as logic, facts or reason. Each of these terms is susceptible to a whole host of differing senses, not only in philosophy, but especially in ordinary usage, depending on who's using the terms. I take it he wishes to judge hypotheses in the common sense by test of logical coherence and empirical observation. The problem arises when Dr. Stein elsewhere insists that every claim which someone makes must be treated as a hypothesis which must be tested by such evidence before accepting it. There is to be nothing he says which smacks of begging a question or circular reasoning. This, I think, is oversimplified thinking and again misleading what we might call the pretended neutrality fallacy. One can see this by considering the following quotation from Dr. Stein. The use of logic or reason is the only valid way to examine the truth or falsity of a statement which claims to be factual. That's the end of the book. One must eventually ask Dr. Steinden how he proves this statement itself. That is, how does he prove that logic or reason is the only way to prove factual statements? He's now on the horns of a real epistemological dilemma. If he says that the statement is proven by logic of reason, then he's engaging in circular reasoning and he's begging the question which he staunchly forbids. If he says that the statement is proven in some other fashion, then he refutes the statement itself that logic or reason is the only way to prove things. Now, my point is not to default Dr. Stein's commitment to logic or reason, but to observe that it actually has the nature of a pre commitment or a presupposition. It is not something he has proven by empirical experience or logic, but it is rather that by which he proceeds to prove everything else. He is not presuppositionally mutual in his approach to factual questions and his own views. He does not avoid begging crucial questions rather than proving them in what we might call the garden variety ordinary way. This tendency to beg crucial questions is openly exposed by Dr. Stein when the issue becomes the existence of God. Because he demands that the theists present him with evidence for the existence of God. Theists like myself would gladly and readily do so. There is the evidence of the created order itself, testifying to the wisdom, power, plan and glory of God. One should not miss the testimony of the solar system, the persuasion of the sea, the amazing intricacies of the human body. There's the evidence of history, God's deliverance of his people, the miracles at passover night in the Red Sea, the visions of Isaiah, the Shekinah, glory in the temple, the virgin birth of Jesus, his mighty miracles, his resurrection from the dead. There's the evidence of special revelation. The wonder of the Bible is God's Word unsurpassed in its coherence over time, in its historical accuracy and its life renewing power. In short, there is no shortage of empirical indicators or evidences of God's existence, from the thousand stars of the heavens to the 500 witnesses of Christ's resurrection. But Dr. Stein precludes the very possibility of any of this empirical Levitist counting as proof of God's existence. He writes, and now I quote, Supernatural explanations are not allowed in science. The theist is hard put to document his claims through the existence of the supernatural if he is in effect forbidden from invoking the supernatural as a part of his explanation. Of course this is entirely fair, as it would be, begging the question, to use what has to be proved as a part of the explanation.

In advance.

You see, Dr. Stein is committed to disallowing any theistic interpretation of nature, history or experience. What he seems to overlook is that this is just as much begging the question on his own part as it is on the part of the theists who appeal to such evidence. He has not at all proven by empirical observation in logic his pre commitment to naturalism. He has assumed it in advance, accepting and rejecting all further factual claims in terms of that controlling and unproven assumption. Now the theist does the very same thing. Don't get me wrong. When certain empirical evidences are put forth as allegedly disproving the existence of God, the theist regiments his commitments in terms of his presuppositions as well. Just as the naturalist would insist that Christ could not have risen from the dead, or that there is a natural explanation yet to be found of how he did rise from the dead, so the supernaturalist insists that the alleged discrepancies in the Bible have an explanation, some yet to be found. Perhaps and that the evil of this world has a sufficient reason behind it, known at least to God. They both have their governing presuppositions by which the facts of experience are interpreted, even as all philosophical systems, all worldviews do. At the most fundamental level of everyone's thinking and beliefs, there are primary convictions about reality, man, the world, knowledge, truth, behavior and such things. Convictions about which all other experience is organized, interpreted and applied. Dr. Stein has such presuppositions, and so do I, and so do all of you. And it is these presuppositions which determine what we accept by ordinary reasoning and evidence. For they are assumed in all of our reasoning, even about reasoning itself. I come thirdly then to the transcendental proof of God's existence. How then should the difference of opinion between the theist and the atheist be rationally resolved? That was my opening question. We've seen two of Dr. Stein's errors regarding the crackers in the pantry fallacy and the pretended neutrality fallacy. In the process of discussing them, we have observed that belief in the existence of God is not tested in any ordinary way like other factual claims. And the reason for that is metaphysically because of the non natural character of God and epistemologically because of the presuppositional character of commitment for or against his existence. Arguments over conflicting presuppositions between worldviews therefore must be resolved somewhat differently and yet still rationally than conflicts over factual existence claims within a worldview or system of thoughts. When we go to look at the different worldviews that atheists and theists have, I suggest that we can prove the existence of God from the impossibility of the contrary. The transcendental proof for God's existence is that without him it is impossible to prove anything. The atheist worldview is irrational and cannot consistently provide the preconditions of intelligible experience, science, logic or morality. The atheist worldview cannot allow for laws of logic, the uniformity of nature, the ability for the mind to understand the world and moral absolutes. And in that sense, the atheist world view cannot account for our debate tonight.

Thank you, Dr. Bonson, for your opening statement. We now Turn to you, Dr. Stein, your 15 minute opening statement, please.

Can everybody hear me? I assume so. Well, I will grant Dr. Bonson his expertise on a conditional resolution of the apparent paradox of self deception which was his dissertation. I don't know how much more relevant that is to our discussion tonight than mine is. Probably not anymore. But I would like to also thank Dr. Bonson for showing us that he really doesn't understand too much about atheism. I will try to straighten them out. This is an important question we're discussing. Perhaps it's the most important question in the whole field of religion, because if God does not exist, then the Bible can't be the word of God, Jesus can't be the Messiah, and Christianity cannot be true as well as other religions. So we're dealing with an important issue here. Now, Dr. Bonson repeated for me that the existence of God is a factual question. I don't think he would dispute that. I think he misinterpreted what I said. When I said that we solve factual questions in the same way, I didn't mean exactly the same way. I mean with the use of reason, logic and evidence. And that is what I'm holding. Now, first, let me make clear what atheism is and is not. I think this is a very commonly misunderstood subject. Atheists do not say that they're. That they can prove that there's no God. They also. An atheist is not someone who denies that there is a God. Rather, an atheist says that he has examined the proofs that are offered by the theist and he finds them inadequate. Now, if I were to say that this gentleman sitting on the front step could fly by flapping his arms, I would make a kind of unusual statement and it would be up to me or him to demonstrate that he could fly. If he can't demonstrate it, then we don't believe that he can fly. Now, if he doesn't demonstrate it right now, that doesn't mean he can't fly. It just means he can't fly right now. Now, so that we do not deny that he could fly because he can't demonstrate it right now. But we say he has not proven his case and therefore we do not believe that he can fly until he does so prove so. And this is what an atheist says about the existence of God. He says the case is unproven, not disproven. So an atheist is really someone who is without a belief in God or who does not believe in a God. It is not someone who denies the existence of a God or who says that one does not exist or can prove that one does not exist. Now, I think I would like to define a God as. Well, I am not so sure I like his definition. I'm not going to stick to just Christian God. I'm going to stick to all kinds of God and I'm going to use the definition which both Father Copleston and Bertrand Russell both agreed on in their famous debate. Now this was both sides, the leading exponents of both sides, both managed to agree on the definition of God. So I think it must be at least an adequate one, if not a great one. And this is the definition. A supreme personal being distinct from the world and creator of the world. Now before asking for proof of God's existence, we need this satisfactory definition. And I think I've given one which I will find at least satisfactory. And if Dr. Bonson doesn't agree, we can hear from him. Now nothing can qualify as evidence for the existence of a God unless we have some idea what we're searching for. That's why we need the definition. Okay? Now throughout history, 11 major kinds of evidence or proof have been offered for the existence of God. In my campus visits I have heard all kinds of other things offered as proof, but they basically fall into those 11 categories with some juggling. And if these 11 proofs do not work out logically or lead to logical self contradictions, then we can only say that God's existence is not proved, it's unproven, not disproven, as I mentioned before. Now if, if I assert that this gentleman can fly by flapping his arms. As I said, the burden of proof was on him. Supposing I make a more complicated statement. Supposing I say that my dog can talk in complete sentences. Okay, well again, I'm making a kind of unusual statement and it's up to me to offer the evidence. So I better be prepared to do that, or I better be prepared to have people not believe what I say. And I'd like a demonstration either of this gentleman's flying or of my dog talking. If I were the person who was being asked to make a conclusion before I admitted that such things were possible or existed. Okay, now how easy would it be to show that this gentleman cannot fly or that my dog cannot talk in complete sentences? As I mentioned before, we get into a real problem when we're trying to show that something cannot happen or that something does not exist. For example, if I wanted to prove that unicorns do not exist, I can examine this room and we can find out that there are definitely no unicorns in this room, that small area. But to prove the general non existence of something like unicorns, we would have to search the entire universe simultaneously. And then we could only say that no unicorns existed at the moment we searched the universe. But you know, maybe they were there five minutes before, or if we only searched the whole earth, maybe they were on another planet at the time. I mean, there are all kinds of other possibilities. So you cannot prove that something does not exist. And that's why, as I mentioned before, the definition of an atheist is not someone who thinks he has proven that God does not exist, because you cannot. Okay, now all those 11 major proofs, I'm going to go over some of them very quickly. They've been 900 years in the formulation, and during this 900 years, this is basically what people have come up with. The first cause argument, also called the cosmological argument. It says that everything must have a cause, therefore the universe had a cause, and that cause was God. God was the first or uncaused cause. Okay, well this leads into a real logical bind for the theist, because if everything must have had a cause, then God must have had a cause. If God had a cause, then he was not the first or uncaused cause. If God did not have a cause, then not everything must have a cause. If not everything needs a cause, then perhaps the universe is one of those things which doesn't need a cause. So you see that we've gotten into a logical bind there, and that proof basically fails. Now, I'm giving you a real short synopsis of each of these proofs that you can fill an entire book in half. So you have to understand I'm oversimplifying slightly, but I think I'm retaining the logic of it, both the pro and con. The second one is the design argument, also called a teleological argument. It says that the universe is wonderful and exhibits evidence of design or order. Things which show such wonderful design must have had a designer who was even more wonderful, and that designer was God. Well, if the universe is wonderfully designed, surely God is even more wonderfully designed. He must therefore have had a designer even more wonderful than he is. If God did not require a designer, then there's no reason why such a relatively less wonderful thing than the unit as the universe needed one. Again, we're into a logical self contradiction. The argument from life says life cannot originate from the random movement of atoms, yet life exists. Therefore, the existence of a God was necessary to create life. Well, basically life didn't originate from the random movements of atoms, and no scientists would say so, because there are limits on the chemical composition and physics of atoms, and they don't move in any possible way, and chemicals do not combine in any possible way. That's why when you see these 1 billion to 1 kind of odds that people have said for life originating, they're all wet. They haven't considered the possibility that not every reaction can occur. So it's possible to explain the origin of life without a God, and using the principle of parsimony or Occam's razor. I think we are left with the simpler explanation as the one without the God. I'll go into more detail on that later. Then we have the argument from Revealed Theology, which seems to be one of Dr. Bonce's favorites. It says that the Bible says that God exists. And the Bible is the inspired word of God, therefore what it says must be true. Therefore God exists. Well, this is obviously a circular argument. It begs the question. We're trying to show whether God exists. Therefore, calling the Bible the word of God is not permitted because it assumes the existence of the very thing we're trying to prove. Now, if the Bible is not the word of God in this case, then we cannot give any real weight to the fact that it mentions that God exists. It does not become a proof. In fact, to prove God from the Bible is standing things on its head. First you must prove God. Then you may say, examine whether God wrote the Bible or dictated it or inspired it. But you can't really use the Bible, as Dr. Bonson seems to want to do, as evidence for the existence of God per se. Then we have the argument for miracles. It says that the existence of miracles requires the presence of a supernatural force, that is a God. Miracles do occur, therefore there is a supernatural force or God. Again, this is begging the question. It requires that you must believe in the existence of a God first beforehand. And then you say that there are such things as miracles which are the acting of a God to create violations of his own laws. So it is not evidence per se. It can serve as supplementary. Once you have good evidence in another kind of a way for the existence of a God, then you can use miracles as additional argument. But in and of itself it doesn't show the existence of a God because it assumes that which is to be proven. I just want to quote you one little thing from Thomas Paine about miracles. If we see an account given of such a miracle by a person who said he saw it, it raises a question in the mind of the very that is very easily decided. Which is, is it more probable that nature should go out of her course or that a man should tell a lie? We have never seen in our time nature go out of her course. But we have good reason to believe that millions of lies have been told in the same time. It is therefore at least millions to one that the reporter of a miracle tells a lie. I think those are good odds. Then we come to the ontological argument, one of the most difficult ones to explain to people. But basically it says God is by definition perfect. A necessary quality of any perfect object is that it exists. If it did not exist, it would not be perfect. If perfection requires existence, then God exists, since God is perfect. Now, I don't know if you follow that, but I think this has been pretty well ripped to shreds by philosophers. And I think the problem lies with the trouble. The trouble is with the word exist. In order for something to be perfect, it must first exist. I mean, if something did not exist, the word perfect wouldn't mean anything. So first you must have existence. Then possibly you may have perfection. So this again is going backwards. And you must have an existing God, then you can decide whether he's perfect. If perfectness is a quality of a God, then he may be perfect, but he first must exist. Then we have the moral argument. All people have moral values. The existence of these values cannot be explained unless they were implanted in people by a God. Therefore God exists. Well, the answer to this is that there are simpler ways of explaining the origin of moral values without requiring the existence of a God to implant them. The people. Besides, if moral values did come from a God, then all people should have the same moral values, and they don't. People's moral values are the result of an accommodation which they have made with their particular environment and then taught to their children as a survival mechanism. Okay, then we have the wish argument. Without the existence of a God, people would have no reason to live or be good. Therefore there has to be a God. Most people believe in a God, therefore there is a God. This really isn't a proof, it's just a wish. It's like saying it would be nice to have a God, which it would, but you know, that doesn't have anything to do with whether there is one or not. Finally, we. Oh, I'm missing one here. When we have the argument from faith, the existence of a God cannot be proven by the use of reason, but only by the use of faith. The use of faith shows that there is a God, therefore God exists. Reason or logic is a proven way of obtaining factual information about the universe. Faith has never been shown to produce true information about the universe because faith is believing something is so because you want it to be so. Without adequate evidence, therefore, it can't be used to prove the existence of anything. In addition, the additional fact is that Faith often gives you the opposite answer to what is given by reason to the same problem. And this also shows that faith does not provide valid answers. The argument from religious experience. Many people have claimed to have had a personal experience or encounter with God. Therefore he must exist. Now, this is a difficult one to handle because first of all, I've never had such an experience. But I'm sure people have absolutely, honestly reported having had such experiences. But the feeling of having met God must not be confused with the fact of having met Him. This is a confusion, a semantic confusion. And also, we cannot use our own feelings as if they were valid information about the world. They are feelings that we have inside of us, but you cannot demonstrate them to another person. That cannot be used as an evidence. If everyone had that same experience, like if we all looked around the room and we all agreed there was a clock over there, then we might say that the vision of a clock was a consensual one, that everyone agreed on it. Other than that if you saw a clock and nobody else did, or only two or three people did in the room, we would have a bit of a problem. Pascal's Wager is the last of 11 arguments. I hear this a lot on the campuses. It says, since we don't know whether a God exists or not, we have no way of finding out in this life. We have nothing to lose by believing in a God. On the other hand, we have a lot to lose if we do not believe in a God and therefore later turns out to be one after we're dead. Well, this is only true if, number one, you're right about a God. And secondly, if you have picked the right religion, because you might wind up at the Judgment Day and be right about a God. But he says, what religion were you? And you say, I was an Islam believer in Islam. And he said, sorry, Catholicism is the right religion. Down you go. So in addition, we might also have, if we have a God who punishes people who live virtuously lives, let's say an atheist who lived virtuous life, did wonderful deeds in the world, but just did not believe in a God, if the God punishes him, then we have an irrational God who's just as likely to punish the believer as the unbeliever. Thank you, Dr. Stein.

We will now move to our period of cross examination. The first cross examiner will be Dr. Bonson. We'll have an opportunity to cross examine. Dr. Stein, if I could please have silence, we would appreciate it.

Dr. Stein, do you have any sources that you can give to us very briefly that define atheism as one who finds the theistic truth inadequate rather than one who denies the existence of God.

Yes, sir. George Smith's book, which you will find for sale in the back of the room upstairs, later called Atheism the Case Against God, which I think is the finest book ever written on the subject, makes this quite explicit. I happen to have a copy right here. I can quote you the exact words if you'd like to see them.

That won't be necessary.

Okay.

Do you have any other sources?

Do I have any other sources? Sure. What would they be? Charles Bradlaugh. Who? I will give them to you right now. 200, 100 years ago, Charles Bradlaugh made the comment in one of. In his plea for atheism. He said that'll be fine. Okay.

Well, Dr. Stein, did you hear Dr. Bonson use the following argument? The Bible says that God exists. And the Bible is the inspired word of God, therefore what it says must be true. Therefore God exists. You did not use that.

You just assumed that that was so because you were quoting from the Bible as if it proved existence of God.

I assumed. I asked you if I used that argument.

No, you did not use the argument, but you used the results of the argument.

Dr. Stein, you mentioned 11 basic proofs for the existence of God. Did you mention the transcendental proof for the existence of God?

No, I didn't mention it by name. I think it is not a proof. I would not call it a proof if, as I understand it from what you said.

In other words, you didn't deal with that particular one. Are all factual questions answered in the very same way?

No, they are not. They're answered by the use of certain methods though that are the same reason, logic and presenting evidence.

I heard you mention logical binds and logical self contradictions in your speech. You did say that.

I said it. I used that phrase, yes.

Do you believe there are laws of logic then?

Absolutely.

Are they universal?

They're agreed upon by human beings. They aren't laws that exist out in nature. They are.

Are they simply conventions then?

They are conventions, but they're conventions that are self verifying.

Are they sociological laws or laws of thought?

They are laws of thought which are interpreted by men and promulgated by men.

Are they material in nature?

How can the law be material?

That's the question I'm going to ask you.

I would say.

Another sign that you have an opportunity to cross examine.

Doctor. Dr. Bonson, would you call God material or immaterial?

Immaterial.

What Is something that's immaterial.

Something not extended in space.

Can you give me an example of anything other than God that's immaterial?

Laws of logic.

I ask that you hold that down, please.

Are you putting God in the same as an equivalent thing to the laws of logic?

No.

Only if you think all factual questions are answered in the very same way. Would you even assume that by thinking there are two immaterial things they must be identical?

No, I'm not assuming that. I'm just assuming that because the laws of logic are a convention among men. Are you saying that God is a convention among men?

I don't accept the fact that claim the laws of logic are conventional.

Okay. Is your God omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent?

He is.

You don't find this a contradiction at all?

I do not.

Okay, well, we'll show you a little later that it is. If your arguments in favor of the existence of God are shown to be incorrect, will you relinquish your belief in God?

If my arguments are disproven, yes.

Will I relinquish my belief in God?

If there are no arguments for the existence of God, I wouldn't believe in God.

That's not quite answering the question. If someone can show you that there are no arguments, would you relinquish your belief? I'm trying to see what's the basis of.

You said that it's impossible to show a universal negative. No one can show that there are no arguments for the existence of God. So we can only deal with those that I know of.

Okay. If someone showed that all of the ones that you produced were invalid, what would be your position?

Well, you'd have to describe further the conditions of this. Rationally speaking, if there is no basis for belief in the existence of God, I would relinquish that belief.

Is God good?

Yes, he is.

How do you know that?

He saved me. He created me. He made the world and he made it good. He sent his son into the world to die for my sins. Many of these evidences are quite convincing to me, but I don't use them outside of the worldview in which they make sense in which they would be taken as true. If you mean is God good in such a way, or can I give you evidence that you would accept? That would depend on what your presuppositions are.

No, I'm asking if God says something, anything, is it right? Because what God? Anything God does is good because God is good, or does it become good? Just because God said it. I don't know if I said that right. I guess I did.

No, I understand the problem, though. It's roughly stated what God says to be good is good because it reflects his own terror. God is good and is the standard of goodness. That's one of the presuppositions of the.

Christian worldview, doesn't it? Indeed. Isn't it indeed a presupposition which is presupposed before there is any actual data from God?

Is this a question about my first opening statement?

In a sense it is, because although it isn't directly mentioned in your opening statement, it has to do with the whole idea of whether there are absolutes outside of God, which is a important issue in this whole debate. May come up later.

I still think we're straining at the limits of debate rules here, but I will answer your question. There are no absolutes outside of God.

So in other words, the fact that God is good is something that God told you and that's why you accept it rather than knowing it ahead and assuming it as a presupposition, which you said a minute ago.

That's extremely simplistic. God told it to me and he.

Provided evidence of it. But you also said it was a presupposition.

That's right.

Isn't that. Isn't that a contradiction?

Oh, not at all. There are many things which are presupposed as well, as evidenced in this world. For instance, the laws of logic.

I would disagree with that, but I still have some time.

All right.

When we talk about immaterial things, are you also saying that there's such a thing as, let's say, ghosts or the soul, which are another example of immaterial things? Would you call them immaterial?

I would say that man is a living soul and has an immaterial aspect to his being. Yes.

And how would you approve this?

This have to do with the existence of God, then?

Well, it has to do with the existence of immaterial things.

Well, if there's an immaterial being, God, and if the Bible is His word, then I would say that his revealing the nature of man in the Bible is sufficient proof. And that takes us back logically, as you'll be bound to say, to whether God himself does exist. And that's what we're supposed to be debating.

Okay, so you're giving me a circular.

Argument, which I'm telling you what the debate is about.

I know what the debate is about. I'm asking for an answer to a question, and I Didn't get one.

I'm not debating the nature of the soul tonight, but the existence of God. Yes, I believe in the man has a soul.

Okay. The only reason I asked about the soul was because this is a simpler immaterial object that most people would hold is also immaterial. I would say that it's similar.

I mean that's your claim, simpler.

I said not similar. Okay.

Having concluded our segment of cross examination, we will now begin final rebuttals for segment number one. Dr. Bonson, I now turn to you for an eight minute rebuttal.

Thank you. Dr. Stein is not into this debate yet. Tonight we are debating the nature of, I mean the existence of God. I specified that I would be speaking in order to avoid logical contradictions of one particular view of God, the Christian view of God which I personally hold. Dr. Stein says that he will not restrict himself to the Christian conception of God. Well, that's fine, he may not, but to all the time he uses on anything that's not the Christian conception of God will be irrelevant. In fact, I will join him in refuting those other conceptions of God. The existence of God that I'm arguing tonight is the Christian one. Secondly, when Dr. Stein defines an atheist as one who finds the theistic proofs inadequate, that is unproven, but not disproven. He's engaging in linguistic revision. He does quote for us, of course. He said that he could, and I trust that he can, to atheists who likewise define atheism that way. But you see that it strikes me as similar to a Christian who defines his position as being true at the outset and therefore it must be true because it's true by definition. He has minimized the task that is before him by simply saying I'm here to show that the theistic proofs are inadequate. Well, you see, even at that though he didn't do his job, even though that was less than what he really should be doing because he gave us 11 basic proofs for God attributing one to me that I didn't use and do not use and did not assume. He mentioned 11 basic proofs but did not deal with the one that I gave in my opening presentation. So he has not dealt yet with the argument that is before us this evening. Dr. Stein has mentioned logical binds and logical self contradictions. He says that he holds that the laws of logic are universal. However they are conventional in nature. That is not at all acceptable philosophically. If the laws of logic are conventional in nature, then you might have different societies that use different laws of logic. It might be appropriate in some society to say both my car is in the parking lot and it's not the case that my car is in the parking lot. That is law. Certain societies that have a convention that says go ahead and contradict yourself. Of course, there are in a sense some groups within our own society that might think that way. Thieves have a tendency to say, this is not my wallet, but it's not the case that it's not my wallet. They might engage in contradictions like that. But I don't think any of us would want to accept that the laws of logic are not conventional or not sociological. I would say the laws of logic have a transcendental necessity about them. They are universal, they are invariant, and they are not material in nature. And if they are not that, then I'd like to know in an atheist universe how it's possible to have laws in the first place, and secondly, how it's possible to justify those laws. The laws of logic, you see, are abstract as abstract entities, which is the appropriate philosophical term. Not spiritual entities, as Dr. Stein is speaking of, as abstract entities, that is to say non individual or universal in character. They are not materialistic as universal. They are not experienced to be true. There may be experiences whereby the laws of logic are used, but no one has universal experience. No one has tried every possible instance of a law of logic as invariant. They don't fit into what most materialists would tell us about the constantly changing nature of the world. And so, you see, we have a real problem on our hands. Dr. Stein wants to use the laws of logic. Tonight, I maintain in so doing he's borrowing my worldview. For you see, within the theistic worldview, laws of logic make sense. Within the theistic worldview there can be abstract, universal, invariant entities such as the laws of logic. Within the theistic worldview, you cannot contradict yourself because if so, do you engage in the nature of lying? And that's contrary to the character of God as we perceive it. And so the laws of logic are something that Dr. Stein is going to have to explain as an atheist or else relinquish using them. The transcendental argument for the existence of God then, which Dr. Stein has yet to touch and which I don't believe he can surmount, is that without the existence of God it's impossible to prove anything. And that's because in the atheistic world you cannot justify and cannot account for laws in general laws of thought, in particular, laws of nature cannot account for the human Mind and the fact that it's more than electrochemical complexes and events and cannot give us moral absolute. That is to say, in the atheist conception of the world, there's really no reason to debate because in the end, as Dr. Stein has said, all these laws are conventional. All these laws are not really law like in their nature, they're just. Well, if you're an atheist and a materialist, you'd have to say they're just something that happens inside the brain. But you see, what happens inside your brain is not the same as what happens inside my brain. And so what happens inside of your brain is not a law. It doesn't necessarily correspond to what happens in mine. In fact, it can't be identical with what is inside of my mind or brain because we don't have the same brains. If the laws of logic come down to being materialistic entities, then they no longer have their law like character. If they are only social conventions, then of course what we might do tonight to win the debate is just define a new set of laws and we'll say all those who want the convention that says atheism must be true or theism must be true, and we have the following laws which we conventionally adopt to be prove it. You see, we'll be satisfied. But no one is satisfied. That's not a rational procedure to follow. The laws of logic cannot be avoided. The laws of logic cannot be accounted for in materialistic universe. Therefore the laws of logic are one of many evidences that without God you can't prove anything at all.

Thank you, Dr. Bonson. Dr. Stein, your eight minute rebuttal please.

Okay, I'll now touch on transcendental evidence, the existence of God, which is, I think the only time I could really do such is in my rebuttal. But first I'd like to do one more important thing. Rather than asking what is the cause of the universe? We must first ask does the universe require a causal explanation? Rather than asking what is responsible for design in nature, we must ask does nature exhibit design? God is given as a solution to a metaphysical problem, but no consideration is given to whether such a problem exists in the first place. But God is not an explanation for anything. For example, if you say, if I ask you how did the universe come and you say God created it? That doesn't answer the question. The question is how did God create it? And I defy any theist to explain how God created it. Basically what you're saying is that an unknowable being is responsible for a given phenomenon which he caused through unknowable means. And that's not an explanation, but rather a concession that the phenomenon is totally inexplicable. Now about the laws of science, an atheist world. First of all, I don't think that Dr. Bunsen understands what a scientific law is. A scientific law is an observation that's made over and over and over again. The law of gravitation. We drop objects all over the world in different situations and we always observe that they fall to the earth. So eventually we make a statistical statement that objects are likely, almost 100% likely to fall to the earth if they're not accelerating in the opposite direction. Okay? In other words, a rocket doesn't fall to the earth immediately, but eventually will if it doesn't escape the gravity of the earth. So these scientific laws are merely consensuses based on thousands and hundreds of thousands of observations. The laws of logic are also consensuses based on observations. The fact that they can predict something correctly shows us that we're on the right track, that we're corresponding to reality in some way. If I can plug in a formula and show exactly where a cannonball is going to land and predict exactly where it will strike, then my mathematics is reflecting something valid about the behavior of cannonballs that are fired on this earth. Otherwise I wouldn't have picked the exact spot. Mathematics is basically logic again used in the same way by consensus of tested things that are self verifying. I'm not explaining it as well as I could, but that's basically what I'm saying. An atheist universe then goes on the basis of the fact that matter has certain intrinsic behavior patterns. Electrons repel each other as they're both negatively charged. Protons repel each other. An electron and a proton attract each other. The opposite poles of a magnet do that. It's an inherent property of matter. That is what produces the regularity in the universe. If there were no regularity, then there would be no science possible because you couldn't predict anything. Matter wouldn't behave the same the second time as it did the first time, or the third or the fourth. So the lack of having a God is in no way detrimental to logic and to having laws in an atheist universe. In fact, if we had a God, we could very easily have an irrational God who did things capriciously so that if I threw a ball one time I threw it, it would go up and the next time down and, you know, crash straight down and soar right up. That would be just as much evidence for a God as a regularly behaving ball or object drop. I mean, we could have a God who makes the rules and changes them from time to time, or we could have one that makes things the same, or we could have the universe that just behaves that that way normally. Now, To ask what caused the universe, although we didn't get into this exact thing. I'm trying to show you that it's to ask an absurd question in the first place, to give God as the answer. First of all, I mentioned it doesn't explain anything. But secondly, before something can act as a cause, it must first exist. That is, it must be a part of the universe. And the universe sets the foundation for a causal explanation, but it can not itself require a causal explanation. I don't know if that's clear. If I say every human being had a mother, that's a valid question. But if I asked who was the mother of the human race, that is a non valid question because the human race didn't have a mother. I can ask what was the cause of this planet exploding? But to ask what was the cause of the universe is to ask an invalid question. And to offer the answer as God is to offer an invalid answer to an invalid question. We haven't gotten into morality. I think I'm going to leave that for the second half. If Dr. Bonson doesn't raise it, I will. He makes an awful lot of statements that are basically feelings. He felt God entered his life, he felt that this happened, he felt that Jesus was resurrected. If he were held to the historian's standard, especially the standard required when a miracle is done, as David Hume said, when a miraculous or very unlikely event such as the resurrection. Although Hume didn't use that exact analogy, that exact example occurs. We must demand an extraordinary amount of proof. If I say the sun is going to rise tomorrow, we don't need too much proof because it's rising every day. If I say the sun is not going to rise tomorrow, then we need an extraordinary amount of evidence before someone will take that seriously because it's an unusual event. Okay, now he has not held up the historian's standard to a lot of the things he's accepting from the Bible as evidence for God. And I think that if he did so, he would soon see that those evidences dried up. Now to get to transcendental evidence. Finally, The statement that if God did not exist we couldn't prove anything and that logic and scientific laws would be invalid is absolute nonsense. And I think I've demonstrated part of that. He says that laws of logic are the same everywhere. This is not true, although they are mostly the same. And I wonder if he's ever heard of a Zen Cohen. And the answer to a Zen cone is something which, like, you know, what is the sound of one hand clapping is the most famous Zen cone. The answer to that kind of a question is in a different type of logic, in a sense, or it's extra logical, if you want to call it that. But I do think that most logic as we accepted in the Western world and most of the eastern world is basis of agreement on people that reflect something about the universe. The idea that transcendental evidence for the existence of God is that the impossibility of the opposite, that the world view would not be rational if it were atheistic, is total nonsense. And I've demonstrated to you that it depends on the inherent properties of matter. If matter has the properties where it behaves regularly, then we have order in the universe and we have a logical, rational universe without a God. The God issue is not germane if matter behaves in a regular way. And I would hold that the properties of matter as demonstrated over and over again are regular and it's an inherent property of matter. So I think that the transcendental evidence statement can be dismissed as mere wishful thinking coupled with misinformation about what scientific laws are and what atheists would hold. In fact, most scientists, in fact, science itself is atheistic. Science is not allowed to use a supernatural explanation for anything. And there's a very good reason for that. If your experiment came out one way, you could say God did it. If it came out the opposite way, you could say God did that. You would never make any progress in explaining anything in science. And so the agreed upon consensus for rules in science is that naturalistic explanations only are asked for and allowed.

We have concluded segment number one of this evening's debate. We will now enter segment number two of this evening's debate. Dr. Stein will open segment number two with a ten minute opening statement.

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