When I was a baby Christian I would avoid sin for fear of punishment. Eventually I grew out of that. No, I didn’t grow out of wanting to avoid sin. It’s just that the motivation and means by which I avoid sin have changed.
Now, by always desiring to honor God, avoidance of sin naturally occurs. See, if I’m aiming to honor God at all times, sin is not even in my thoughts. It’s when I forget to honor God in what I’m doing, that sin begins to creep in.
On morals: People who believe in Darwinism cannot adequately explain why anyone should obey any kind of moral law. On Darwinism, why shouldn’t the strong prey on the weak to get what they want? If nothing exists beyond this world and beyond this life, why not rape, steal, and kill to get what you want? Why should the powerful stand up for the weak and poor among us? It’s a noble thing to do, but on Darwinism it’s senseless. On Darwinism, there is no ultimate standard, but the Darwinists go on acting like there is.
On love: Darwinists obviously believe in natural selection and macroevolution. It is widely known that on this view, love is merely a chemical reaction in the brain. It’s a way to describe the devolpment of these chemical reactions in order for us to survive. If a Darwinist is to be consistent in his worldview, he should be ready to say his love for his wife and children are illusions. He should be prepared to tell them that the love isn’t actual; the love is merely a means that helps his own genes survive. That’s it. Nothing more.
Let’s see some examples of how Darwinists should be living and acting if they truly are consistent. There does exist consistent Darwinian atheists. Their views are alarming, as follows.
On the value of life: There is a Darwinist named James Rachels who you should know about. In his book, Created From Animals, he says that retarded people are nothing more than animals. He says they should be used the way humans use non-human animals—as lab subjects or possibly for food. Another Darwinist, Peter Singer, thinks parents should be allowed to abort their children after they have been alive outside of the womb for up to 28 days! He also says newborn human babies are of less value than the life of a pig!
The bottom line is that if only material things exist, then horrible behaviors espoused by some Darwinists and some atheists such as baby killing and eating retarded people, really aren’t wrong. They’re simply chemical reactions in the brain. None of these things can be objectively wrong because on a view of natural selection there are no moral laws if our brains are reacting to chemicals. In fact, our governmental laws could not be enforced if the world operated on Darwinism. Raping and murdering would simply be considered unfashionable at most. Fortunately, all rule of law is based on a transcendent moral law, just like the transcendent morality cited in order to convict the Nazi’s at the Nuremberg trials.
I’ve noticed how many liberal, skeptical-minded nonbelievers tend to have strong convictions as it relates to protecting the environment, liberating the poor, eradicating diseases, and justice for the oppressed. All these things are worthy causes, though we all hold different methods by which we think they should be addressed.
I also notice some glaring contradictions with this kind of thinking among skeptical non-believers. These non-believers create an inconsistent worldview for themselves. They like to say things like, “all senses and convictions can be explained through biological evolution.” They readily admit that since we have evolved via natural selection, we can’t completely trust our own senses. They say our belief in God is simply a belief that has helped us survive, not that there is an actual God. They think beliefs, even our false beliefs, are beneficial to our survival and that is how our false belief in God originated. Maybe so. But here’s the rub with this kind of thinking: If we cannot trust our faculties as it relates to the falsity or truth about God, then why should we trust our faculties as it relates to anything at all, including macro-evolutionary science? To put it another way, if our cognitive faculties tell us only what we need to survive, not about what is actually true, why trust those faculties about anything at all? What a glaring contradiction!! Couldn’t it be then that this idea of macroevolution is simply an imaginary one that has merely assisted our human development? Why trust it?
We know God exists not because we have tangible proof, but because of cumulative clues that point very strongly toward His existence. We have the Cosmological Argument about causation of the universe. We have the teleological argument regarding the undeniable design features of the universe. We have the Anthropic Principle, which describes the delicate fine-tuning of the universe to allow life to survive. We have the regularity of nature. We have the existence of undeniable, objective moral values and duties. All of these things (plus many more) cumulatively form a solid basis for God’s existence.
But there are a few more things to add to the list. Remember what I wrote in the first paragraph. Many people have a very deep conviction to protect the environment, stand up for the oppressed, help the poor, and eradicate disease. As I pointed out, under a macro evolutionary view of the world, we have absolutely no reason to trust our convictions in these areas. After all, under this view, how can we trust anything we think to be true? Why should we carry a strong conviction about environmental issues? A Darwinist, if he is to be consistent, should admit it’s all just an illusion. The point is this, if there is no God, we should not trust any of our cognitive faculties at all.
But the problem for the Darwinist is that he does trust his cognitive faculties in areas he is most passionate about! He goes on about his every day life using his cognitive faculties and trusting them probably more than he trusts anything else. He has no real basis to say nature will go on regularly but he goes right on benefiting from nature’s regularity. He has no ultimate purpose for his social causes but he goes right on crusading for them.
However, if we believe God exists, we have every right to trust our cognitive faculties. We have every right to know the list of evidences for God is actually real. We can ground all the questions about the regularity of nature, moral obligations, helping the poor, or caring about God’s creation. Believers can crusade for justice and environmental stewardship because we have ultimate purpose in doing so.
Just like the bible states in Romans 1:19-20, everyone knows God is there. But isn’t it funny that those who deny him cannot actually live that way consistently?
It’s probably safe to say that everyone has experienced thoughts of doubt concerning God and if he is really there. I have had my own doubts from time to time. Unfortunately, my doubting was sometimes labeled “sin.”
“How could a committed Christian ever doubt God?” they would ask. I guess they thought that if I had some shred of doubt that I had backslidden or I wasn’t really a Christian. That kind of response to a doubter can have devastating effects.
One of my favorite biographies is Walter Isaacson’s account of the life of Steve Jobs. Early in the book, Isaacson recounts that Jobs’ parents wanted him to be raised with a religious upbringing, so they took him to church. When Jobs was thirteen years old he came across a copy of Life magazine that had on its cover a picture of two starving children is Biafra. Jobs had been taught in church that God is all-knowing. He took the magazine to his pastor and asked if God knew about these starving children and what would happen to them. The pastor responded by saying that God knew about those children and that it was beyond Jobs’ understanding. This was not a sufficient answer for young Jobs. His pastor didn’t acknowledge Jobs’ doubts about God head-on. As a result, Jobs walked away from Christianity as a thirteen year old boy and the rest is history.
We can learn at least two things from this story. One, how not to deal with the doubts of young people and two, always being prepared to give an answer (1 Peter 3:15). Jobs’ pastor had a golden opportunity to tell young Steve how we may not have all the answers to why bad things happen to innocent people, but Christianity does offer the best explanation to the origin and nature of the universe, the human condition, sin and evil in the world, and the redemptive power of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection.
Timothy Keller makes this remark about doubt: “People who blithely go through life too busy or indifferent to ask hard questions about why they believe as they do will find themselves defenseless against either the experience of tragedy or the probing questions of a smart skeptic.” We have good reasons to probe our doubts. After doing this we may learn to respond to tough questions. Perhaps Jobs’ pastor didn’t know how to respond to Jobs’ doubts because he never investigated the matter for himself. It’s hard to say. But one things remains, Steve Jobs was not in error to question why bad things happen under the watchful eye of our Creator God.
I want to focus on a couple of questions. Should we trust our doubts and can doubts actually help our faith to grow instead of hindering it? To address the first question we must understand that all doubts are a set of alternate beliefs. For example, a person may doubt Christianity is true because he has an alternate belief that there can’t be just one true religion. But notice that the person’s doubt rests on an assumption that there cannot be only one true religion. How does the person know for sure there cannot be only one true religion? In other words, the person’s doubt is really a leap of faith. So, the point is this: if you have doubts about Christianity, put your doubts through the same rigorous tests as you do Christianity and you may find that your doubts aren’t very solid after all.
The question about our doubts helping us to grow our faith is found in the Bible. John the Baptist was a friend of Jesus and a mighty man of God. He was a prophet, a preacher, and the one who boldly announced Jesus’ arrival as the messiah. He saw the Spirit of God rest on Jesus, marking him as the Savior. John the Baptist had tremendous evidence for belief in Jesus as God incarnate. In fact, he was thrown into prison for his convictions.
Matthew chapter 11 reveals the doubting side of John the Baptist. He is sitting in prison with lots of time to think about things. After all the experiences he had since the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, he had the audacity to send his friends to ask Jesus if he was really the Messiah. Jesus’ response to John’s doubting is very important. Jesus didn’t condemn him or make fun of John. He told John’s friends to report to him the things they had just heard and seen–the blind seeing, the lame walking, the lepers cured, the deaf hearing, and the Gospel being preached. Jesus gave John good evidence to keep his faith. He didn’t call him a sinner or tell him he didn’t understand. John kept his faith for the rest of his life and was later beheaded.
Another famous Biblical doubter is Thomas. I think Thomas gets an undeserved negative reputation in the Bible. I happen to like Thomas. Him and I think a lot alike. In John chapter 20, after Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, Jesus begins to appear alive again among his disciples. The disciples told Thomas about this encounter of seeing the resurrected Jesus and Thomas didn’t believe them. Thomas said, “I won’t believe it unless I see the nail wounds in his hands, put my fingers in them, and place my hand into the wound in his side.” Wow! Those are some heavy demands. Not only does he want to see Jesus and his wounds, but he wants to actually put his fingers into Jesus’ nail holes! Eight days later, Jesus appeared to Thomas and his friends. Jesus did not condemn Thomas or tell him he was in sin. Rather, Jesus’ first words to Thomas were, “Put your finger here, and look at my hands. Put your hand into the wound in my side. Don’t be faithless any longer. Believe!” Incredible! Jesus provided Thomas with evidence to help him with his doubt. Thomas then proclaimed Jesus his “Lord and his God” and his faith was strengthened through his doubt.
We all come across doubts from time to time just like these giants in the Bible did. It’s important to stress that doubt and unbelief are not the same thing. Doubt can be described as questioning and looking for answers. You can doubt and still be a believer. Christians need to know how to deal with doubt and maybe more importantly, learn to help others navigate their doubts. Here’s some points on how we should and should not respond to doubt.
Ways to not respond to doubt:
Good ways to respond to doubt:
Douglas Groothuis gave a talk some time ago on his own doubts. He had this to say:
“I have found in the toughest times of life I sometimes do not experience the presence of God. God seems to be distant. But what I come back to is that Christianity is true. There are reasons to believe it.
“And in my ministry, my career, I have tried to study every major worldview, reading primary sources, writing, debating, and having conversations. That was a process. It didn’t happen all at once. I didn’t attain a high level of certainty the minute I became a Christian. That had to develop through questioning, through investigating, through conversations.
“But I am a living example of someone who knows too much to walk away. Especially in the last year I have experienced some rather acute crises and suffering…But as bad as it gets and as angry as I can get at the Lord, I can’t deny that the Gospel is true. The Gospel has a firm and unyielding hold on me and I’m a Christian by the grace of God.“
I agree.
I came across a video today where the Alabama Chief Justice, Roy Moore, was debating CNN morning anchor Chris Cuomo, who is the son of former NY
governor Mario Cuomo, and the brother of current NY governor, Andrew Cuomo. In the video which I have posted below, Justice Moore contends that rights come from God. Cuomo objects to the justice’s position rather strongly. Not only does he wrongly object, but he constantly confuses rights and laws, which are not the same thing. But in any case, whether Cuomo is using the word rights or the word laws, he is trying to argue that rights are not given by God, but that they “come from collective agreement and compromise.” The nearby image I posted contains words from the U.S. Declaration of Independence, in which the founders of the United States clearly affirm that human rights are endowed to us by the Creator, God. Moreover, those words were written by the very liberal Thomas Jefferson, who was merely a deist and not a monotheist in the historical Christian sense…and even he recognized our God-given unalienable rights.
Following that sentence in the Declaration, it says that the purpose of government’s existence is to secure these rights. The government can do this only if the people consent to it.
It is an extreme danger to think the way Cuomo thinks about human rights. In fact, it’s so dangerous we should be teaching our children from a very early age that human rights are not subjective to individuals or a community of people. For these very reasons are exactly how the Nazi’s and other murderous people attempted to excuse their evil, murderous acts.
Several months ago, I wrote about the subject of human rights and where they originate. I think this is an appropriate time to re-publish that article. I’m posting it below, just under the video clip of Justice Moore and Mr. Cuomo. Please watch the short exchange before reading the re-post of my earlier article.
http://www.mrctv.org/embed/132978
From October 17, 2014
No kind of human “rights” can be created. True rights are always discovered. Think about it: if rights are simply created by majorities in the populace or majorities in legislative bodies or high and mighty judges, then we are admitting that human rights are subjective.
On this view, what happens to those “rights” when someday they are legislated out of existence by a new majority? What one generation considers a “right,” another generation may consider illegal, and vice versa.
It’s ridiculous to believe this way. Why? Because humans abide by objective, moral human rights in our daily lives. We know it’s wrong to torture babies for fun. Babies have a right to live free from torture and everyone knows it. No one has to legislate the immorality of that kind of behavior. But if rights and morality are simply created, then it may be ok for some other cultures to torture babies. Even if some strange people group adopts a culture of torturing babies, is it still objectively wrong? Of course it is.
What if in Nazi Germany, the majority of Nazis desired the right to eliminate the Jews? (Which they did!) Did the will of the majority make their actions commendable? Of course not. That’s not a true human “right.” It’s a desire to do what you please. Likewise, no matter what a specific individual may think about killing Jews or torturing babies, it’s still objectively wrong. Every. Single. Time.
Rights and morality are not something that came about by natural forces. For instance, take members of the animal kingdom. Is it wrong for them to kill to survive? No, it’s not wrong. Animals are amoral beings that do not have the ability to submit to obligations of “rights” and “morals.” But why do humans not follow the same “natural” behaviors like animals do? Why do humans have a sense of morality, altruism, and justice? It’s because we are a higher being made by God, in his image. These obligations to morality and rights can only be explained fully through the teachings in the Christian Bible. They make no rational sense whatsoever based on a naturalistic worldview.
Rights and morality are based on something far greater than the cultural trends of our time. True rights are not arbitrarily created based on current, trendy volitions. True rights and morality do not conform to human desire because human desire is flimsy. Instead, humans should conform to the objective morals and rights we know to be solid and true.
It’s important to think about the origination of true rights and morality before we can understand how to respond to laws imposed on us against our will. Christians need to know how to formulate rational positions for their worldview. Going around telling people they’re going to Hell isn’t always the best way to reach people with the truth. But having a rational, coherent reason (given in love) for the hope that is in you can be very effective.
Studying Christian apologetics is a much more daunting task than I ever imagined it would be when I first embarked on the challenge. There are many requirements to be an effective community apologist. Some of the requirements I have met, and others still need some work.
First, you must be a Christian in love with Jesus. Second, you must want to tell others about Jesus. Third, you must be socially confident, winsome, and conversational (I need to work hard in this area. It does not come naturally for me). Fourth, you must be willing to question every single thing about your faith that you know to be true; you must put your very core on the line and test it. Not everyone is cut out for this part. And last, you must be willing to read, read, read, and then read some more. Thankfully, reading is recreation for me.
At this point in time I feel like I have built a solid foundation for an effective Christian apologetic. I still have a long way to go. I wanted to share the apologetic books I’ve read so far in working to be an effective apologist.
To give you an idea of the types of apologetic books I prefer, you need to know that there are several methods of apologetics. Of the several methods, the most popular methods are classical, presuppositional, evidential, and cumulative case. My preference is cumulative case with a heavy emphasis on the classical approach. I will not define these here but perhaps I will in a future post.
The following list contains the apologetic books I have read so far in no particular order. (I hope I don’t forget any). I will label them (B) for beginner, (I) for intermediate, and (A) for advanced. These ratings are purely subjective based on how difficult they were for me to absorb and understand.
So there’s my list. I have most of these in paper versions which happen to be my favorite. I have 4 of these titles on my Kindle account. I have three of these titles on my Audible account. The rest of them are sitting on my bookshelf. The one’s I pick up most often are Christian Apologetics by Douglas Groothuis, I Don’t Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist by Turek and Geisler, Reasonable Faith by WLC, Beyond Opinion by Ravi Zacharias, Darwin’s Doubt by Stephen Meyer, and all of the C.S. Lewis classics. But that’s not to say I don’t reference all of them. I underline in them and make notes on the flaps. The flap notes are extremely helpful because as I read I’ll have a thought and naturally that same thought will occur to me later and the flap notes help me to quickly find what I’m needing.
I try to read two books per month on average. If a book is less than 200 pages I can sometimes squeeze it in as third in one month. I don’t necessarily speed read but at the same time, I do actually read instead of sitting around watching TV, etc. I’ve been writing articles more frequently as of late because sometimes I need a break!
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the list. Let me know if you have read any of these and what you think of them. Also, post your own apologetic recommendations if you want!
Altruism is a behavior and feelings that show a desire to help others and show a lack of selfishness. The reality of altruism is a huge problem for atheism and Darwinian evolution. We know altruistic behavior has existed for as long as knowable human history. An example of why this creates major problems for Darwinian evolutionists can be understood in the following examples. A newspaper runs a story at Christmastime detailing the difficulties of a less fortunate family that is very needy. A man reading the story is compelled to anonymously donate a large portion of money to this needy family to help them get through winter, to have necessities, and gives them the ability to provide some extra Christmas gifts to the children of the family. This anonymous, altruistic action offers absolutely no kind of evolutionary advantage yet things like this happen all the time. It stands to reason that, since this kind of behavior offers no evolutionary advantage, the trait of altruism should have disappeared long ago, if Darwinian evolution were true.
Consider the following story, which is true. In May 2012, several groups of people were attempting to climb Mt. Everest as they do every year. A young Israeli climber was nearing the summit when he came across another climber who had run into trouble. This Turkish climber had fallen and lost most of his equipment, including his oxygen tank and his face mask. He was clearly going to die very soon. The Israeli halted his ascent and spent several hours helping the distressed Turk back down Everest. He saved the Turks life and lost three of his own fingers and four toes to frostbite. He also lost his lifetime dream of reaching Everest’s summit.
In addition to all that, since May 2010, Turkey and Israel have been political enemies. There is no love lost between these two countries. So why did the Israeli risk his own life and give up his own dreams for such a self-less act? It’s possible that he could have gained a better standing in the mating world had he had he been able to place “Everest Conqueror” on his dating resume. The act did not do a thing to save and propagate his own DNA. He did not save one of his relatives or even someone of his own ethnicity. These are things that atheism cannot adequately answer.
What does atheism and Darwinian evolution have to say about this subject? Natural selection tells the evolutionist that all humans strive to propagate their genes through future generations. Some evolutionists claim that altruistic prestige that goes along with say, being a fireman, attracts healthy, beautiful females to altruistic males who, if they survive the risk of dying, have the ability to better propagate their genes over men who are less willing to risk their lives. This is a flimsy argument on its own merit. Oftentimes, complete slobs who are lazy and cowardly can attract beautiful women. Maybe the slob has huge amounts of money from an inheritance or lottery winnings, as “luck” would have it. Moreover, based on Darwinian evolution, it seems strange to me that any woman would want to reproduce with a man who consistently risks the gene pool by tempting death or giving away his family’s money to help others. Let me be clear. I understand things like this happen, it just doesn’t make sense based on Darwinian evolution.
Evolutionary biologist W. D. Hamilton has another explanation to the problem of altruism. He claims that an altruistic person will still save his genes because he is more likely to rescue or die for his own kin. He says you can save two of your children at the expense of your own life. But if you’re saving cousins, your one life would have to save four cousins to make it worthwhile. Or if you’re saving second cousins, you would have to sacrifice your one life for eight of your second cousins in order for the statistical formula to work and for your genes to be properly propagated. These genetic computations seem very, very questionable. Who would really be ready and willing to calculate these formulas in preparation for an altruistic action?
Geneticist E. O. Wilson has recently shied away from his lifelong belief that evolutionary processes could account for altruism. He has begun to use an example that compares people to ants. Ants will “choose” to assume roles that will shorten their own lives to enhance the colony. But, as mathematician and the history of science research fellow at Boston University Amir Aczel asks, what is analogous to the human “colony?” Is it one’s family, race, community, nation, etc.? Aczel reminds us of examples of people jumping in icy water to save a dog or firemen rushing into a fiery building to save a cat. Neither act will be beneficial to the “colony.”
People all over the world are paid modest wages to fight as soldiers and to serve as policemen and first responders. They do altruistic acts for people of different races, ethnicities, languages, religions, etc. European Christians risked their lives to save Jews from the Nazis. Soldiers form brotherly bonds that cause one another to fight to their death to save their comrades. As Aczel (who is agnostic) points out, “To claim that these are acts that propagate one’s own genes would seem preposterous.”
So what could be the cause of this kind of behavior? The answer to me is very simple. It is caused by decency and goodness that is rooted in a decent and good God who upholds all of creation (Col 1:17, Psalm 100:5). Christians have a great deal of evidences for objective morals rooted in God such as goodness, selflessness, kindness, and generosity. We are friends of a good God (James 2:23) and friends and helpers to one another (Matt 5:42). Christians have very good evidence for God’s existence, the truth and authenticity of the Bible, and the truth of the resurrection of Jesus. If we follow the evidence where it leads without a presupposed worldview, we can find the answers to many, if not all, of our questions.
(Some of the material in this article has been adapted from the book by Amir D. Aczel, Why Science Does Not Disprove God (New York: HarperCollins, 2014).
I’ve been doing some reading on the surge of post-modernism that has swept over the youth of western culture. Where “modernism” was the remnant of the Enlightenment era, post-modernism has ushered in a new era that replaces modernity and the atheists seem to be reluctant to deal with it or possibly are unaware of the culture around them and how it’s changing. Post-modernism rejects the aspects of modernity that gave rise to atheism.
Post-moderns are very resistant to worldviews that claim to offer an all encompassing view of reality, such as Christianity. On the other hand, post-moderns are very closed to a purely materialistic view of reality that atheism offers. Post-modern young people embrace exploration of the spiritual aspect of life. I’m not taking about Christian spirituality. They don’t want anything to do with any kind of “religion.” But seeing things for how they are, Christians see a gold mine of opportunity to evangelize these youngsters with Christian truth. Unlike atheists, Christians have written and taught a great deal to respond to post-modern thinking.
On the other hand, atheists tend to ignore and dismiss these young people as irrational and superstitious. Oxford professor Alister McGrath has some interesting thoughts on the modern version of atheism and its waning influence among young people. I’d like to quote him here:
“Atheism offers precisely the kind of metanarrattive, or big picture, that postmodern thinkers believe leads to intolerance and oppression. Its uncompromising and definitive denial of God today sounds arrogant and repressive rather than principled and moral.
“For intellectual historians, atheism is a superb example of a modern metanarrattive: a totalizing view of things locked into the worldview of the Enlightenment.”
McGrath goes on to say, “Fundamental to the Enlightenment worldview is the idea that there is only one way of looking at things, and that those who disagree are either bad or mad. The simple truth is that the cultural pressures that once made atheism seem attractive are being displaced by others that make it seem intolerant, unimaginative, and disconnected from spiritual realities. It’s an interesting question, and one I don’t see many atheists rushing in to engage with.”
McGrath continues, “[This interest in post-modern spirituality] represents for the atheist a quasi-superstitious reintroduction of spiritual ideas, leading postmodernity backward into religious beliefs that atheism thought it had exercised.
“Atheism seems curiously disconnected from this shift in cultural mood. Atheists appear to be graying intellectually, recycling the same old arguments and inhabiting a dying and modern world, while around them a new interest in the forbidden fruit of the spiritual realm is gaining the upper hand, above all among young people.”
I liked the preceding quote and think McGrath is spot on with the trends of the day. And he’s right about the graying intellect of the atheistic movement. The face of the new atheists is Richard Dawkins, an old, white dude who always looks angry. I thought that description was reserved strictly for the Right Wing conservatism of American politics? Lol.
Before you accuse me of ad hominem, IT’S A SELF-DEPRECIATING JOKE! So chill.
All jokes aside, Christianity and its answers to our questions have been relevant since the time of Jesus and continue to be so all these years later. They stand the test of time and have never turned gray. In fact, Christianity is downright EXPLODING in Africa, Southeast Asia, and South America. The future is indeed bright and the mission fields of Western culture are ready to be plowed!
P.S. I wonder if the new atheists think it unfortunate that Dawkins is the leading caricature of their little movement? If I were them, I’d at least want Christopher Hitchens as my logo, even if he is dead. Hitch was a jerk and I obviously disagreed with almost everything he ever wrote, but at least he was a likable guy and in fact, he was a gracious jerk to boot. His wit and humor makes Dawkins look like a sour puss (putting it lightly). I see people who often try to copy Hitchens’ wit and it just makes them look stupid. It’s unfortunate Hitchens never converted.
The subject of this writing is something that comes up fairly often. The assertion made by the atheist to the Christian is that minds cannot exist without brains. We must be very concise in how we respond to this assertion. Christians do not necessarily claim that the mind does not use the brain and the brain does not use the mind. The claim a Christian should make is that the mind and the brain are two separate things. Claiming anything more or less than that is unnecessary. Let me define something before moving forward. For the purposes of this article, I am going to use the terms mind and soul interchangeably. The main thing we are looking at here is the differences in the material (the brain) and the immaterial (whether that’s the soul or the mind).
The first thing that must be pointed out when discussing this matter is that science cannot really do much of anything to help us answer the question. All science can do is show that X causes Y, or that Y depends on X. To illustrate this think about the self-driving cars being tested by Google. Let’s say you tell the car GPS where you want to go and sit back in your seat to relax until you arrive. So this car is required for your transportation. You are dependent on it. Likewise, the car is dependent on you to tell it what to do. You are not the car and the car is not you but you both need each other to reach your ends. Now let’s say the car breaks down and you are trapped inside. If you couldn’t escape the car, you would be dead for all intents and purposes. But, if you can remove yourself from the car, you can get around again. So, in this case your body is not the same thing as the mechanism that was transporting you. I want to show that souls (and minds) and physical bodies are like this. The soul (and mind) uses the body but when the body breaks down, you leave the body and still exist. Your self-consciousness lives in a body but is not the body. This is a basic description for how a Christian describes a soul.
Ok, back to showing how this matter cannot be answered by science. A well-known atheist by the name of Peter Atkins claims, “There is no reason to suppose that science cannot deal with every aspect of existence.” This type of thinking is called “scientism,” which I consider a sort of religious viewpoint. If Atkins claim is actually true then there are many disciplines that we should toss out the window such as literature, poetry, art, music, ethics, and philosophy. How can science tell us that the Mona Lisa is a work of genius? Science can tell you that adding poison to someone’s drink can kill them but it cannot answer whether the act was right or wrong.
The great Oxford mathematician, philosopher of science, and bioethicist, John Lennox gives us an example of how science cannot deal with every aspect of existence. He tells the story of his Aunt Matilda baking a beautiful cake and the cake is submitted to top scientists for analysis. The nutritionists will calculate the calories and tell us its effect on the body. The biochemists will tells us about the structure of the fats and proteins in the cake. The chemists will describe the elements involved in their bonding. The physicists will analyze the cake in terms of fundamental particles. The mathematicians will offer equations to describe the behavior of those particles. After all of this can we say the cake is completely explained? We know the how of everything but suppose someone wanted to know why the cake was made. Aunt Matilda knows she made the cake for a purpose, but not a single scientist in the world can tell why she made it. Unless Aunt Matilda tells us, they are powerless. Science cannot answer questions of ultimate purpose. Moreover, it’s absurd to say that because Aunt Matilda made the cake for her nephew who just earned his degree, that we must dismiss purpose as an illusion because science cannot deal with it.
There are many things that are far outside of scientific explanation. Two big ones are laws of logic and laws of nature. Science could not even happen without the scientist presupposing laws of logic and laws of nature. C.S. Lewis once said, “Unless human reasoning is valid no science can be true.” Science simply cannot explain these things. The main point is that science deals with the materialistic world but there are clearly immaterial things in the world. To name a few: laws of logic, laws of nature, love, guilt, emotions, reason, etc. If everything can be reduced to materials as atheists insist, then the atheist has a huge problem on his hands.
Darwin knew this. He even admitted that his ideas on evolution are bunk if a human soul exists, that is to say an immaterial being that exists apart from the physical body. Macro evolution rests on a foundational presupposition that immaterial minds do not exist. That is why atheists must cling fervently to the idea that there is no mind, but just a moist brain. Perhaps Obama would refer to them as “bitter clingers.” If there is an immaterial mind, their dogma on evolution is false! It is presuppositional belief. Remember this!
Now that we know this topic is outside the realm of science we can discuss whether the mind and the brain are the same thing. One way we can know this is not the case is by showing the mind is not materialistic like the brain. If it was, then you would be an entirely different being today than you were 15 years ago. We know the brain changes molecules completely about every 7 to 15 years. So if your mind was completely material, it would not be the same as it was 15 years ago, but yet, you are the same being with the same personality.
Think about this: Let’s say scientists are experimenting on your brain and they prod it in different areas. They may prod one area and it conjures up a memory. They may prod another area and it may conjure up an image of your sister wearing a pink dress. Now, if your mind was just as physical as your brain, the scientist should not have to ask you what is in your mind during the experiment. It seems somehow, somewhere he could dig around in your brain and find the image of your sister in a pink dress. But he cannot. That’s silly. Furthermore, no one is aware of their physical brain. The subject would never say, “Oh, I just felt a molecule line up when you prodded and it corresponded to my sister in a pink dress.” So, you are unaware of your physical brain, but you are certainly aware of what’s going on inside you.
Humans can experience two types of sensations. One type is an awareness detected by the five senses. The other is awareness not detected by the senses such as fear, love, anger, and thoughts. These types of sensations can be described using words and can be true or false. Physical states cannot be true or false but thoughts can. Mental states in the mind do not have size or shape and are not spatially located. Everything about the brain runs counter to all of this. The brain is completely physical. A scientist may have more knowledge about my brain than I do but he can never have more knowledge about my thoughts, emotions, and mental state than I do. I know what my thoughts and feelings are but a scientist can never inspect these things.
There is no amount of information in my moist, physical brain that can tell a person who I am, my dispositions, and my personality. If I am just a brain then others ought to be able to know everything about me by prodding around in my brain.
If I am only a brain and do not have a mind, then all my behaviors, intentions, and decisions, are fixed by my brain, genes, and environmental input. Physical objects always, always, always obey natural laws and inputs, therefore if I am only a material brain then I am simply reacting to molecular reactions based on natural laws. If this were the case I would have absolutely ZERO grounds to claim free will. I would no longer be personally responsible for my actions, whether good or bad. And on top of that, I wouldn’t be able to freely type this article!! But, as the empirical evidence shows, free will does exist and it requires that we are more than just a physical brain reacting to the laws of nature. Therefore, I am a mind and soul that has a physical body.
When we are asked a specific question such as, “What is your middle name?” we can answer that question specifically. How can blind, repetitive laws of nature explain our ability to answer such a question? Should we think that molecules magically line up in the proper way by blind, repetitive laws to respond accurately? That’s the height of absurdity! We have the intelligence and intentionality to answer correctly. Mere physical objects cannot do things like this. A rock is just a rock. It does nothing but exist as a rock. If humans are simply materialistic beings, then why should we believe we have any more of an ability to reason than a rock?
Concerning the placebo effect, it’s always funny to see the atheists squirm with this one. To put it in basic terms, it’s mind over matter. A person in severe pain can be told he will be administered pain medicine. He believes this to be that case when the doctor actually gives him a sugar pill to swallow. Studies show that in up to 45% of patients, the mere thoughts in their mind of getting what they think is actual medicine will cause their pain to subside. Likewise, the mind can cause the body to deteriorate quickly when consumed by depressive thinking and mental stress. This makes no sense if the mind is physical. The publication New Scientist magazine listed the placebo effect as number ONE on its list of “13 Things That Don’t Make Sense.” Well of course it doesn’t make sense if you approach the matter from presuppositional Darwinian evolution dogma!
When Christians claim to have a soul separate from the body the atheists get very, very militant. And earlier I showed why. They think this is superstition when in fact they are the superstitious ones! They are the ones who believe their creator magically popped into existence out of nothing by nothing by chance. And by the way, chance is not a cause. It’s a way to describe mathematical possibilities or to gloss over ignorance on a particular matter that can’t be answered on atheism, a sort of “God of the gaps” for the atheists. Speaking of nothing, atheistic evangelist Daniel Dennett claims consciousness is an illusion. Now think about that for a minute. In order to detect an illusion you would have to see and know what is actually real! LOLOLOLOL. So apparently he exempts himself from his own theory. I wonder when he wrote that nonsense if he sat there and thought, “You know, every truth claim I believe and am writing is an illusion.” Let’s hear him talk about that on his book tour!
It’s important to point out that the notion of the mind being the same as the brain is not a mainstream scientific idea. This notion is popular in atheistic circles but there are plenty of scientists who don’t buy it, rightly so. Nobel Prize winning neuroscience professor John Eccles supported the theory that the mind is a separate entity from the brain and cannot be “reduced down to the brain cell processes.” That’s just one Nobel Prize winner. There are hundreds if not thousands of search engine results with some great peer-reviewed resources showing how science is baffled by this subject. And it will stay baffled for reasons we discussed. It’s really not a scientific issue, but I digress.
So this notion of mind and brain is very easy to discern. Sometimes it just takes a little bit of thought (pun intended). Remember, to be a consistent atheist, materialism must be true. To be a consistent atheist, the mind cannot be immaterial. Former world-famous atheist Antony Flew had something to say on the matter. He said, “Science cannot discover the self; the self discovers science.” Perhaps, that is partly why he became a former atheist.
Consider this quote by Alister McGrath:
“Atheism argued that it abolished violence and tyranny by getting rid of what ultimately caused it: faith in God. It was a credible claim in the 19th century precisely because atheism had not yet enjoyed the power and influence once exercised by religion. But all that has changed. Atheism’s innocence has now evaporated. In the 20th century, atheism managed to grasp the power that had hitherto eluded it. But then atheism proved just as fallible, just as corrupt, and just as oppressive as any belief system that had gone before it. Stalin’s death squads seemed just as murderous as their religious antecedents. Those who dreamed of freedom in the new atheist paradise often found themselves counting trees in Siberia or confined to the Gulag—and they were the lucky ones.”[1]
One of the key aspects of the French Revolution was that in France, the church was seen as being on the side of government. As a result of the church being interested in its own power and authority as opposed to being interested in the welfare of the people, atheism began to look sexy. As McGrath points out, “For many in modern Europe, the conclusion was obvious: religion is an oppressor; atheism is a liberator.[2] Clearly though, as the 20th century proves beyond all doubt, atheism leads to an oppressive end.
Fast forward to our post 9/11 world and we see the publication of three books by authors who apparently don’t know history or ignore the atheistic bloodbaths of the 20th century. In response to the 9/11 terrorism, atheistic evangelists Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Daniel Dennett published books labeling religion a threat to the well-being of mankind.
Put very simply, they claim religion causes mass murder. But, when one takes an objective view of the facts, we see suicide bombers are motivated by a much more complex set of circumstances.[3] As it turns out, religion is neither a necessary nor sufficient reason for suicide bombers. The common factor found in suicide bombers is the sense of total helplessness in the face of perceived oppression coupled with a lack of conventional military capacity.[4]
We need to forcefully squash these silly assertions made by today’s “new” atheists. This kind of thinking leads me to believe that the new atheists do not have a firm grasp of the implications of their own worldview as it turned out in the 20th century. Learn to recognize these facts and bring them up. These attacks on Christianity by the new atheists need to be soundly and intelligently crushed.
[1] Quoting Alister McGrath in the book by Ravi Zacharias, Beyond Opinion (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2007) p. 29
[2] Zacharias, p. 25
[3] See more in the book by Diego Gambetta, Making Sense of Suicide Missions (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005)
[4] Zacharias, p. 28
Logical Faith 