In Memoriam—John Hick (1922-2012)

John Hick, the eminent scholar in the world of religion, died at the age of 90 on Thursday, February 9, 2012. Many will mourn the loss of this gentle man and incisive thinker. But we will also count ourselves blessed to have known him, and celebrate his work among us for so many decades of fruitful scholarship.

I first met John Hick in 1985 or 1986 following a lecture he delivered at the Claremont Colleges, in southern California. I had just written my M.A. thesis (for Gonzaga University) on his treatment of the problem of evil. When I shared this with him, he said he would be interested in reading it. After he had read it, he wanted to meet. So we scheduled a get-together at the colleges and talked about my project. I will always remember two things he said to me at this meeting. The first thing he said, once we got down to business, was that, in my exposition of his position, I had gotten it right. He added that this was unusual for critics of his various views. This put me at ease immediately. We may have met for an hour. Toward the end John asked me what plans I had for publishing my thesis. I had no plans. But John urged me to seek a publisher for it, and offered his assistance.

This was indeed an auspicious beginning to a long-term friendship with one of the world’s foremost religious scholars of the 20th century. It led, eventually, to the publication of my first book, Evil and the Evidence for God: The Challenge of John Hick’s Theodicy (Temple University Press, 1993), with an Afterword by John himself.

A few years later, John’s book, An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent (Yale University Press, 1989) was released. This book was the publication, in expanded form, of his Gifford Lectures, delivered at the University of Edinburgh, 1986-1987. The book earned him the prestigious Grawemeyer Award for Religion. Shortly after its release, the Claremont Graduate School hosted a major conference, with scholars from various places around the world present to discuss his sophisticated defense of religious pluralism. I was a graduate student in philosophy at the University of Southern California at the time, and I was surprised by the invitation I received, with John’s support, to participate in the proceedings and present a paper of my own.

In this way I was drawn into the discussion of religious pluralism. Shortly after I was appointed to my first teaching post at Taylor University (Upland, Indiana), Wheaton College issued a call for papers for a conference on religious pluralism. I sent a brief proposal for a paper evaluating John Hick’s position. Because it was one of very few proposals for a direct discussion of Hick’s important contribution to the topic, I was told, I was invited to deliver my proposed paper.

Dennis Okholm and Timothy Phillips, who had hosted the conference, eventually developed the idea for a book that was to be called More Than One Way? Four Views on Salvation in a Pluralistic World (first published by Zondervan in 1995 and later reissued under the moderately abbreviated title Four Views on Salvation in a Pluralistic World in 1996). Again, I was invited to participate, and I was asked if I might contact John Hick to request his participation, as well. He agreed. The two other contributors were Alistair McGrath and Clark Pinnock. Gary Phillips was co-author with me for a chapter we titled “A Particularist View: An Evidentialist Approach.” John’s chapter was called, sensibly and simply enough, “A Pluralist View.” The most illustrious contributor, of course, was John Hick. And it’s very possible that the book remains in print on account of his contribution.

These are the only projects in which I partnered, after a fashion, with John Hick. But we had many get-togethers over the years. Most of these happened during the years he was at Claremont, where he held the Danforth Chair in the Philosophy of Religion from 1979 to 1992. At other times we would meet when we happened to be at the same professional conference. The second most memorable occasion of our meeting was long after he had retired and I visited him at his home at the end of Seeley Oak in Birmingham, England.

John Hick was a brilliant communicator, in print and with a microphone. He was a gracious scholar who respected would-be scholars 40 years his junior. He was tenacious in defense of his many controversial positions, and friendly and tolerant toward those who disagreed. Always fair-minded and even-handed in his dealings with me, he marked my life in ways no other scholar of similar repute has (or could have), and he steered me in ways he would never have known.

John was Irenaean as opposed to Augustinian in his theodicy, a universalist and a pluralist in soteriology, a kind of Kantian anti-realist regarding the existence and nature of God—all things that I am not. But there are two reasons why he could not be ignored. First, he reasoned his way to his positions with great care and he could articulate them with great clarity. Second, he had begun his theological odyssey as an evangelical of more-or-less the sort that I am, but had gradually and in nearly step-wise fashion moved further and further away from this starting point in his career as a professing Christian. His kindness toward me would naturally count as a third reason to engage and evaluate his work with the same care that he exemplified as book after book flowed from his pen.

When I last saw John Hick, I suspected that we would not see each other again. He had ceased traveling across the pond, and I had no immediate plans to return to England. But we remained in touch over many years. I will miss his Christmas cards. And I will miss him.

For more on John Hick:

• John Hick: The Official Website
• Brief biography for the Gifford Lectures
• Biography at Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• The John Hick Centre for Philosophy of Religion

I wish to thank Fred Sanders, writer for The Scriptorium, who encouraged me to post about my experiences with John Hick. See Fred’s post here.

Coincidences of Life – Ender’s Game and a UPS Truck

UPS Truck . . . without a driver

This afternoon I was waiting at a red light (northbound on Palm at Central in Brea, CA, if the coordinates matter) and listening to the audio-book for the sci-fi novel Ender’s Game, by Orson Scott Card. Just as the light turned green, one character said to the other, “I drive a truck for the United Parcel Service.”

This struck me as odd, showing up in a work of science fiction. But stranger still, as I shifted my motorcycle into second, a UPS truck passed me in the intersection going south.

Was it a coincidence? Of course it was. It was quite literally the coinciding of an auditory reference from one source and a visual reference from another source to the same company, UPS. These sensory experiences occurred simultaneously. They each conveyed information, and the information conveyed referred to the same thing. I heard a guy say through my headset, “I drive a truck for the United Parcel Service” just as I waved to a guy driving a truck for the United Parcel Service. (Well, actually, I didn’t wave.)

Uncanny?

Sort of.

The Merriam -Webster Dictionary defines “uncanny” in this way: “seeming to have a supernatural character or origin,” or “being beyond what is normal or expected: suggesting superhuman or supernatural powers.”

The concurrence of two causally unrelated references to the same informational content attracts our attention. It is so incredibly unlikely that this would happen, it seems almost to have been planned. Was it planned? And if so, who arranged it? It might take superhuman or supernatural powers to make it happen just so. What other explanation could there be?

“Coincidence,” we say, with palpable matter-of-factness. But of course it’s a coincidence. Saying so merely reports an observation of fact. The real question is, what kind of coincidence is it? What is the explanation for this coincidence?

We do explain coincidences in various ways. Sometimes we say, “It was just a coincidence.” By this we mean that there’s nothing more to it than that, a mere coincidence, with no deep explanation. There is no intelligible cause, and no intelligent agent, involved. There is no meaningful answer to the question, “Why did this happen?”

But the question does present itself. It does to me, anyway. Trivial coincidences like this happen in my experience with remarkable frequency. I say “trivial” because I infer no special significance when they happen. And yet it is both remarkable each time it happens and remarkable that it happens as often as it does.

Why is it remarkable if the coincidence is trivial? It’s remarkable because the concurrence is so improbable. The degree of improbability varies depending on the specific character of the information presented. But the improbability of the concurrence does not, as such, warrant attribution of some special significance.

Why not?

The answer, I think, is two-fold. First, we can think of no special reason why the elements in our experience have occurred together. (Note: No one else in the intersection, I believe, actually heard or thought of the words “United Parcel Service” at that moment.) Second, we can identify no  causal mechanism that would ensure that they did occur together. In other words, there is no apparent point in their concurrence, and no obvious causal account of their concurrence. If we thought their concurrence served some purpose, we would naturally be curious about the cause. And if nothing else will serve, we might say that the cause was superhuman and personal. Given a general reluctance to attribute causes to occult entities, we require that a coincidence be specially significant. Also, if the concurrence was caused for our benefit, then we should find some benefit in their concurrence. That is, if we who experience the coincidence were meant to experience it, then there was some reason why it happened and why it happened in our experience. And this suggests that we should be capable of discerning that purpose.

What purpose could possibly have been served by the coincidence I experienced on my way home this afternoon? Nothing comes to mind. “It’s just a coincidence.”

But wait, now that I think that thought, I recall that there was a UPS package for me when I arrived home not two minutes later. Was the coincidence a warning, then? It certainly didn’t have that effect on me when it happened. In fact, when it happened, my thought was, This is something I could blog about. And in retrospect it doesn’t seem that a warning was required. The contents of the package were innocuous. Some clothing I had ordered. I don’t know if it matters, but the package wasn’t waiting on the front porch, as if it had just been delivered by the very same UPS truck. It had been carried in by another member of my household who wasn’t home. (I know she wasn’t home because no one was home. And I know it was a she because I’m the only he in the household. Aren’t you impressed with my awesome powers of deduction?)

I suppose now I might take care trying on the clothing that was delivered. But I can’t seriously entertain the notion that I’m in some kind of danger.

If there was a message, it was totally lost on me.

Could there be some other purpose, completely unrelated to my goals or interests, so that the purpose might be achieved quite apart from my cognizance of it?

(c) 2009 Katherine Gehl Donovan

Sure. A minor demon might have been taunting some innocent angel with her powers of manipulation, claiming to be able to cause me to hear “I drive a truck for the United Parcel Service” and, at the same precise moment, cause me to see a guy driving a truck for the United Parcel Service.

In that event, would it really matter whether I recognized the concurrence of the appearance of a UPS truck just as I was hearing that bit of fictional dialogue? I can imagine a neophyte angel thinking, How did you do that? What if the line I’ve quoted from the story isn’t actually in the novel?

And what if there wasn’t really a UPS truck crossing the intersection in the opposite direction? Maybe the demon’s game was to present me with visual and auditory data that did not correspond with objects matching the data. Who knows what minor demons are capable of?

The point is, if there was a purpose in the coincidence, I have no idea what it was, and this makes it less likely that, if there was a purpose, realization of that purpose depended on my discerning that purpose.

Now, what do I actually believe? Do I believe there was a purpose in the coincidence? I do not. But this is imprecise. Not believing that there was a purpose is not the same as believing there was no purpose. I might simply be agnostic about whether the coincidence served some purpose.

So am I agnostic? No. I believe that no purpose was served.

I should have a reason for believing this, shouldn’t I?

My chief reason for believing that no purpose was served by the event is that attributing a reason does not comport with my worldview. Or rather, my worldview provides no basis for attributing a reason for the coincidence.

What we make of coincidences often is a matter of worldview commitments. Some coincidences do, for me, invite an inference to the agency of some superhuman or supernatural agent. Apparent answers to prayer, for example.

Here’s a question for fellow theists who believe that God exists and is a personal being who created the universe and sustains it in existence, others like me who affirm a doctrine of meticulous divine providence:

How do you decided whether this or that ‘coincidence’ is the occurrence of an event serving some special purpose intended by a superhuman or supernatural being?

Bonus Question: Is the angel/demon image posted here too provocative? Is it poor judgment to use it here?

Christians Who Behave Like Atheists

Image via Wikipedia

In my recent post Are Atheists Haunted by the Possibility of Being Mistaken?, I suggested that it may be common for atheists to entertain severe doubts about their atheism, and contemplate the possibility that God does exist and is worthy of belief and even worship.

It would be easy for Christians to explain atheistic belief in terms of rebellion against a God whose existence is only too obvious and personally offensive. But I would encourage Christians to consider that something resembling this may be found among believers, as well.

Any refusal to face the facts about God in the light of ample evidence is rebellion and idolatry. So one may believe that God exists, but refuse to believe certain things about God. Or one may believe certain things about God but then act in defiance of such a God. And one may assert the existence of God, even argue vehemently that God exists, and yet remain indifferent toward God on the personal level.

A believer, then, should be careful not to apply a double standard in comparing himself with nonbelievers. He should reflect on the possibility that he is like the typical skeptic in fundamental ways.

There are varieties of triumphalist apologetics. One form chastens nonbelievers for attitudes that one would find in oneself if one simply looked closely enough.

Related Articles

• Are Atheists Haunted by the Possibility of Being Mistaken? (douggeivett.wordpress.com)

Are Atheists Haunted by the Possibility of Being Mistaken?

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Archibald Alexander, who was the first professor of Princeton Theological Seminary, wrote in the 18th century:

Whatever may be the truth in regard to religion, it must be admitted to be the most important subject which can possibly occupy the thoughts of a rational creature. It cannot be wise to treat it, as many have done, with levity and ridicule: for even on the supposition that there is no true religion, it is a serious thing that it has got such a hold of the mind, that it cannot be shaken off; so that men of the noblest powers of intellect and the highest moral courage have been subdued and led captive by its impressions. And they who boast a complete exemption from its influence, and glory in the name of atheist or sceptic, do nevertheless often betray a mind ill at ease, and in the extremity of their distress are sometimes heard to call upon that God whose existence they have denied, and to implore that mercy which they have been accustomed to deride. . . . They seem to be haunted with a secret apprehension that the reality of religion will at some moment flash upon their conviction. It is with them a common saying, that ‘fear made the gods;’ but it would be much more true to assert, that fear made atheists; for what but the dread of a Supreme Being could be a motive strong enough to lead men to contend so earnestly against the existence of God? . . . . Indeed, a man should first take leave of his reason before he advocates an opinion demonstrated to be false by everything which we behold.

Alexander suggests that atheists and religious skeptics often are haunted by the possibility of being mistaken. One good reason for this is that there is good evidence for the existence of God.

I’ve noticed that some of the most public and argumentative atheists today deny that there is any good reason at all to believe there’s a God. This, surely, is over-stating the case, even if you think that, on balance, the case against the existence of God is stronger than the case for God’s existence.

Another feature of Alexander’s statement has continuing relevance. The atheist who campaigns for his worldview in a public way today attests to the importance of the question of God’s existence by his vigorous efforts in the marketplace of ideas. And this, too, confirms the claim that religious concern is, for all intents and purposes, a universal concern.

Some who are agnostic about God’s existence may be understandably reluctant to deride religious belief, lest it turn out that God does exist. But if it should turn out that God exists, will it be so much better to have been an agnostic than an atheist?

Are God’s Mental States All in Your Mind?

Where do we get our concept of God? I ask in the first person plural “we” because there is something pervasive and shared about “the concept of God” that we manage to think and talk about with each other.

This is illustrated by the Slate article of a week ago titled “Are You There, God? It’s Me, Brain.” The author, Jesse Bering, aims to explain “how our innate theory of mind gives rise to the divine creator.” Click here to read the article.

The article begins by noting the uniquely well-developed capacity we have to attribute mental states to others of our species, then present evidence that we also attribute mental states to inanimate entities. On this basis, Bering hopes to make a natural inference to the claim that in our thinking about God we are projecting a mental life onto an object that is neither animate nor inanimate, but unreal.

So it would appear that having a theory of mind was so useful for our ancestors in explaining and predicting other people’s behaviors that it has completely flooded our evolved social brains. As a result, today we overshoot our mental-state attributions to things that are, in reality, completely mindless. And all of this leads us, rather inevitably, to a very important question: What if I were to tell you that God’s mental states, too, were all in your mind? That God, like a tiny speck floating at the edge of your cornea producing the image of a hazy, out-of-reach orb accompanying your every turn, was in fact a psychological illusion, a sort of evolved blemish etched onto the core cognitive substrate of your brain? It may feel as if there is something grander out there . . . watching, knowing, caring. Perhaps even judging. But, in fact, that’s just your overactive theory of mind. In reality, there is only the air you breathe.

“What if I were to tell you that God’s mental states, too, were all in your mind?” Great question! I would say, “That sounds like wishful thinking on your part. Show me the evidence.”

Of course, Jesse Bering doesn’t present any evidence. Our capacity to ascribe mental lives to members of our species seems, from Bering’s point of view, to be legitimate. That much is a relief. But our tendency, as Bering would put it, to do the same for inanimate objects suggests that we are somehow hard-wired to err in doing this.

Now, it doesn’t really matter that the evidence Bering presents for our supposed projection of mental lives onto inanimate objects is very weak, because even if Bering is right about that, it doesn’t count as evidence that that’s more-or-less what we’re doing when we think about God. But the evidence that we routinely project mental lives onto the inanimate doesn’t bear the weight of Bering’s conclusion. There are plausible alternative explanations for our behavior toward physical objects when we’re angry and for our talk about objects as if they were personal entities. I don’t slam the car door because I hold my car personally responsible for “refusing” to start and “making” me late to work. But I do slam the door and I do speak this way. The action is expressive of my frustration, if only to myself, and the speech is metaphorical.

When I think and talk about God, my acting and speaking is completely unlike my acting and speaking when my car won’t start. I believe that God is real, is a person, hears and responds to me, and so forth. Unaccountably, Bering doesn’t acknowledge this difference in my so-called “intentional-state attributions.” I only appear, through my behavior, to attribute intentions to my stupid car. But I do not actually attribute intentions to the thing. My behavior does not tell the whole story, a story that I know from the inside, as the person engaged in that behavior. But I do attribute intentions to a divine creator. In fact, I see evidence all around me of a creator’s existence and intentions.

If time allowed, I would show how the reality of our mental lives—acknowledged by Bering—is itself evidence for the reality of God, a supreme being with a real mental life. That will have to be for another time. Meanwhile, I encourage you to read the charming but misguided article by Jesse Bering. It neatly exhibits a pervasive confusion—one that nurtures a very real illusion about God.

Linked to Amazon

Henry Boynton Smith (1815-1876)

February 7

On this date in 1877, Henry Boynton Smith died in New York City, age 61. This theologian, who was born in Portland, Maine, studied at Bowdoin College and at Andover and Bangor theological seminaries. Later, he studied in Germany, getting to know Friedrich Tholuck and Hermann Ulrici at Halle, and August Neander and Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg at Berlin.

I have long had an interest in Tholuck (1799-1877) for his work in Christian apologetics as a German evangelical. Henry B. Smith lectured in apologetics at Union Theological Seminary during the academic years 1874-1875 and 1875-1876. His course of lectures was published in 1882 by A. C. Armstrong & Son.

Smith adopted a three-fold division of Christian apologetics:

1. Fundamental Apologetics
2. Historical Apologetics
3. Philosophical Apologetics

His system is sophisticated and worthy of close study. He begins with the question whether the supernatural can be known (considering first general questions of epistemology) then moves on to “the proof of the Being of God” (p. 46).

Here is how he begins to address the question, “How can we know God?”

The very question implies some knowledge. Unless we had some conception of God we could and would nevermore ask, How can and do we know God? Unless man had some belief in God he would not ask, any more than an animal, Can you prove His being—can you demonstrate His existence?

The questions implies a need, a craving—seeks for an answer to a demand of our rational and moral being. This is the very least that can be said. There is a strong subjective belief—that is the starting-point; and the question is, Is there a corresponding objective reality? Are there sufficient grounds for full belief, binding on all rational and moral beings?

Hence the question is not at all about knowing some unknown thing, about proving the existence of a mere abstraction—as a theorem in geometry. It is as to the proving the existence of a being in whom, somehow, in some wise, we already believe. It is not going from the known to the unknown—but showing that there are valid and final reasons for a strong, universal, native, human belief.

—Smith, Apologetics: A Course of Lectures (1882), pp. 71-72

Later, Smith writes:

1. As the starting-point show that man’s whole nature and man’s whole history prove the need to him of a God; that man by nature and reason is irresistibly prompted to seek for Deity, and cannot else be satisfied. This is not the proof of God’s being, but the basis of proof.
2. That all the phenomena and facts of the universe (so far as known) demand the recognition of a God as their source and unity—a personal God, the necessary complement of the world.
3. That man’s reason (a priori) demonstrates the existence of a real, infinite, absolute being.
4. The combination of 2 and 3 gives is the result and proof.

In its ultimate philosophical principles the proof for the being of God consists of three arguments resting upon three ideas:

(a) The ontological argument, on the idea of being.

(b) The cosmological argument, on the idea of cause.

(c) The teleological argument, on the idea of design.

—Smith, Apologetics, p. 87

In chapter 4, Smith distinguishes between “the Supernatural” and “the Miraculous.” He develops the case for Christian miracles against pantheism and materialism, which both consider the impossibility of miracles to be an axiom. Not only are miracles possible, but on sufficient evidence, it is reasonable to believe that miracles have happened.

Smith says, “Besides having an adequate cause, miracles have also a sufficient end or object, and are never to be considered apart from, or dissociated from that” (p. 102).

Miracles are:

possible, if there is a God;

probable, if a positive revelation is needed; and

they have been [i.e., they have happened], if Christ and his apostles can be believed.

(p. 104)

Smith held that “Christian Apologetics is essentially Vindication. It seeks to vindicate, and in vindicating to establish, the value and authority of the Christian faith” (p. 118). His published lectures are a credit to his effort to do just that.

Note: It was also on this date, in 1664, that Gottfried Leibniz completed his master’s degree in philosophy.

 

Gottfried Leibniz

Michael Shermer on the Mexico Debate

In November, I participated in a three-on-three debate with three atheists, Richard Dawkins, Michael Shermer, and Michael Ridley. This was part of an international conference held in Puebla, Mexico. (See my account here.)

On January 17, 2011, Michael Shermer offered his take on our debate.

I’m inclined to comment briefly on a few of his remarks. Here are ten distinct points to consider.

First, in describing the debate, Michael refers to me and to William Lane Craig as theologians. Just for the record, my field is philosophy. My theology friends would no doubt want people to be clear about that.

On to more substantive points in Michael’s commentary:

Second, Michael argues in his review of the debate that arguments for the existence of God are irrelevant to the question, “Does the universe have a purpose?” This is a hard sell, for several reasons: (1) during the debate, the atheists wanted to be known as atheists who had a different conception of the purpose of the universe than we, the theists—so by their own testimony, what one believes about the existence of God makes a difference to what one thinks about the purpose of the universe; (2) the atheists took pains to repudiate our arguments for the existence of God (though they did not offer substantive objections to the arguments we presented); (3) the atheists were in disagreement with each other about whether the universe has a purpose; (4) of course the universe has a deep purpose if it was purposively created by God (as we argued), and does not have a deep purpose if its existence is not grounded in purposeful agency (as they believe).

Third, Michael has to state a very qualified sense in which the universe does not have a purpose, even if God does exist. He says, “whether there is a God or not, the universe per se cannot have a purpose in any anthropomorphic sense for which that term is usually employed.” This is a pretty baffling remark. Michael seems to confuse two senses of purpose, one where the universe has a purpose per se, and another where the universe has a purpose in some anthropomorphic sense. Since these two apparently separable senses are conflated by the grammar of his sentence, it’s nigh impossible to know what Michael is saying.

As a naturalist, and consistent with how he argued in the debate and has usually argued in debates with me, Michael must deny that the universe has a purpose in any ultimate sense. This may be what he means by his use of “per se.” So if the universe has a purpose at all, it will be relative to human interests. That is, the universe will have a purpose in a strictly “anthropomorphic” sense.

But this is what you have to say if you are a naturalist. It is not what theist’s believe. Again, Michael is mistaken. By his own conception of what “purpose” means, the existence or non-existence of God makes a difference to whether the universe has a deep, transcendent purpose. The theist says it does, and the naturalist says it does not.

Fourth, there is a practical difference, as well. A theist who believes that the universe has a purpose that is determined by God’s own purposes as Creator of the universe will want to know what this means for his own existence, so that he might live wisely and welcome human flourishing on God’s own terms.

Fifth, the atheists we debated have a stake in maintaining that it really makes no difference what one believes about God, since life is meaningful in any case. But whatever meaning the atheist wants to attribute to human existence, it will be whatever meaning humans can make of life without reference to God’s providential purposes. I can admire the moxie of such humanistic optimists. But I cannot agree that the meaning they manufacture in their way is the same meaning that my life has if God exists and if obedience to God’s loving will is the great condition for transcendent human significance.

Sixth, Michael asserts, without argument or evidence, that the laws of nature “have no purpose other than what they dictate matter and energy to do.” Here he betrays that he is a determinist. So I do not know what purpose could even be freely imagined, adopted, and pursued by human persons. After all, on his view, we are but by-products of the swirling mass of matter and energy that, in accordance with the laws of nature, dictate everything that happens.

Here again, Michael assumes that naturalism is true, and then infers that it must therefore make no difference whether there is a God when we ask whether the universe has a purpose. But what explains the existence of laws of nature? He may think there is no explanation. But the theist attributes their existence to the purposeful decision by God to create a universe that functions in accordance with such laws. These laws owe their existence and operation to God, and are operable only insofar as God deigns to leave them alone in their ordering of physical events. A supernatural being is sovereign over the natural laws. Hence, non-natural events are possible and will occur if God chooses to act supernaturally in the world of physical events.

Further, God has created human purposes, in God’s own likeness, with powers of self-determination, so that laws of nature do not strictly determine everything that happens.

Seventh, Michael mocks the notion that stellar stuff ponders its own purpose, as if this ludicrous notion would have to be true in order for the universe to have a purpose. This odd move invites four comments: (1) none of us suggested such a thing, nor is there any basis for thinking that we did, would, or should hold to such nonsense; (2) on Shermer’s view, human beings are little different than star stuff, and it would be as odd to attribute genuine thoughts and deliberations about purpose to humans as it would be to attribute such activities to stars; (3) but of course, we do attribute genuine thoughts, deliberations, and concerns about purpose to human persons, and this is evidence that Shermer’s general worldview is mistaken and that there are “objects in the universe” that have these powers; (4) while stars are naturally indifferent about the purposes they serve, that they serve a divine purpose is of real consequence for us.

Eighth, Michael boldly asserts that “life began with the most basic purpose of all,” that of “survival and reproduction.” How does he know this? Can he tell us how life began? If he cannot—and I’m sure he cannot, otherwise he would have told us by now—then how does he know what “purpose” is served by the existence of life?

Ninth, Michael contradicts himself when he says in one paragraph that even H. sapiens (that’s us!) do not sit around thinking about the purpose of things, and then says in the next paragraph that we are imbued “with a sense of cosmic purpose.” The paragraph after that begins, “Human beings have an evolved sense of purpose—a psychological desire to accomplish a goal.” Hmm. Then we come to the next paragraph: “How we define our purposeful lives may be personal . . . .” So we do define our “purposeful lives” personally. But how, if all is dictated by the laws of nature?

A couple paragraphs later, Michael compounds his inconsistency, admonishing us about how we should live. In answer to the question, “What type of purposefulness should we practice?” he describes specific purposes that he values. But why should anyone value these things? And what, in any case, could we really do to advance them—again, if all is determined?

Tenth, Michael concludes his article with the same proposal that ended his remarks at the debate. He invites theists and other non-atheists to try being an atheist “for an hour,” so that we all may see how little difference it would make to our lives. He has this backwards. Anyone who tries to be a genuine atheist without noticing a difference in his life either must not have oriented his life to the principles of theism, or he has failed to be an atheist, even for an hour.

I encourage you to read Michael Shermer’s account for yourself here. If I have erred in my understanding of his argument, feel free to comment on this post.

Related Links:

• Geivett Retrospective on the Debate
• An Apologetics Lucha Libre

Shermer, Ridley, and Dawkins vs. Craig, Wolpe, and Geivett: Retrospective on the Debate

I’ve finally returned home after two weeks of travel and speaking, which included a debate in Puebla Mexico. I posted details about the event here prior to leaving for Mexico. There you’ll find links to English and Spanish versions of YouTube recordings of the debate.

I’ve had the chance to read some reactions posted in the blogosphere about this debate. I now want to list some specific points and observations of my own, partly to add clarity and partly to set the record straight about some things I’ve seen written.

I hope you’ll watch the debate and leave your objective evaluation in the comments box of this post.

1. Usually, a debate question features one side taking the affirmative and the other side taking the negative. Here, the question for debate was “Does the universe have a purpose?” It was obvious from the correspondence I received from the debate organizers that I was to team with two individuals who agreed in taking the affirmative, and that the other three would take the negative—that is, they would deny that the universe has a purpose.
2. The three of us on the affirmative side—William Lane Craig, David Wolpe, and Doug Geivett—all believe that whether the universe has a purpose depends on whether or not God exists. So we could argue that the universe does have a purpose if God exists, even if time did not allow for detailed arguments that God in fact exists. It would be up to the others—Matt Ridley, Michael Shermer, and Richard Dawkins—to argue that the universe does not have a purpose. Presumably, they would have to include arguments that God does not exist, since that would be crucial to their claim that the universe does not have a purpose. Or, they might argue that even if God exists, the universe does not have a purpose.
3. The moderator introduced us as “theists” and “atheists,” and framed the debate as a debate between theists, who affirm the existence of God, and atheists, who deny the existence of God. Thus, two questions were conflated from the beginning: (1) “Does the universe have a purpose?” and (2) “Does God exist?” The question for any participant, then, was whether to focus on question (1) or question (2).
4. Each of the six of us was allotted exactly six minutes for initial arguments. We were timed and stopped at six minutes. Strict enforcement of time limits is characteristic of debates, but not always understood by observers. I’ve noticed that some who’ve commented on the debate at various blogs have remarked that the moderator should not have interrupted debaters when they were about to make an important point. (The debate was part of a larger conference program.)
5. Rebuttals were limited to three minutes each. Following rebuttals, Michio Kaku was permitted time for a few comments on the debate through that point. His remarks were followed by 90-second closing statements.
6. The decision about which side would go first was determined by a coin toss. The atheist side won the coin toss and Matt Ridley went first. Each team was permitted to sequence its presenters in the order they preferred. Our side followed the order Craig-Wolpe-Geivett for all three components of the debate. We made our decision based on the tasks we each had agreed to perform during the debate. In my judgment, this sequence proved to be effective.
7. How did the opposing teams work together as teams? It should be obvious that our team of theists worked very closely together. Our individual presentations complemented each other neatly and intentionally. We provided a united front in our presentation of evidence and response to objections. We worked together across the board. To illustrate, in his rebuttal, Bill Craig used a brief that I had prepared in response to the problem of evil, should it come up. Collectively, we argued for two main contentions: (1) If God exists, then the universe has a purpose, and (2) If God does not exist, then the universe does not have a purpose.
8. Close observers will understand that our two main contentions directly addressed the published topic of the debate: “Does the universe have a purpose?” Further, they speak to the question of God’s existence in a direct manner. Third, as conditional statements, they do not require for their support any argument that God does, in fact, exist. Fourth, we repeated these two contentions for two primary reasons. First, to remind the audience of our claims, as debaters on both sides took turns speaking. This is a matter of effective communication. Second, to remind the atheist team that this was our position and that it was this that they must address in their response to us. This is a matter of holding the other side accountable to the actual arguments we mustered during the debate. I’ve seen some in the blogosphere complain that I repeated our two fundamental claims in my opening statement. But this was after David Wolpe’s opening statement, which did not repeat the claims, and three opening statements by the atheists. Nearly half an hour had passed since the two claims had been explicitly stated.
9. In his opening statement, Bill Craig explained why the universe would have purpose if God exists, thus supporting our first contention. He then acknowledged that whether the universe actually does have purpose, supposing our two contentions are true, depends on the existence of God. So he used the balance of his six minutes to list several arguments for the existence of God, which all have been developed in detail in his books. In effect, he placed them on the table for the atheist side to refute.
10. In his opening statement, David Wolpe developed the argument from fine-tuning for the existence of God, and hence of purpose for the universe. He then drew a close existential connection between this argument and the human quest for meaning and purpose.
11. I my opening statement, then, I—Doug Geivett—recalled our two main contentions, then addressed the possibility that some on the other side would argue that the universe has purpose even if God does not exist. Following that, I developed an argument, not often heard in debates, that our very interest in the question of the debate is evidence that God does exist.
12. So the trajectory of our three arguments on the theist side was itself purposeful and progressive. Together they represented an eighteen-minute opening argument for theism and purpose. If you put these together in the order in which they were presented, you’ll see that they made for a natural progression, with a build-up along the way toward a climax.
13. It would be absurd, then, to expect any one of us to “carry the day” within the narrow scope of our individual presentations. For example, it’s ridiculous to scold Bill Craig for failing to develop theistic arguments more fully. Considered as a unified whole, our three opening statements complement and serve each other.
14. Now what about the atheist side? This is my opinion and people are free to disagree, but I believe the atheists operated much more independently of each other, and even contradicted each other. In his opening statement, Matt Ridley argued against the idea that the universe has a purpose. Michael Shermer, on the other hand, argued for purpose, precisely as I predicted he would when Bill Craig and David Wolpe and I discussed strategy prior to the debate. This is why my opening statement includes a response to this type of claim with a special argument for the existence of God (see description above), and why my opening statement was third in the series. The atheists struggled to clarify the distinction between purpose in the universe and purpose on the level of human existence. Thus, they seemed sometimes to be arguing against purpose and sometimes to be arguing for purpose.
15. While the atheists alluded to the argument from evil against theism, no one developed the argument in any detail. This was quite surprising and seemed to me a missed opportunity for their side. Of course, we were prepared for something more strenuous, and Bill Craig did address the argument, even more fully than it had been presented. Notice, too, that Craig’s response compounded the evidence we presented for the existence of God, since it embedded an argument from evil for theism. The atheists never had another word to say about this. Nor did the atheists answer my argument for theism. And in response the Wolpe’s fine-tuning argument, they simply mentioned the possibility of multiple universes and the like.
16. Richard Dawkins is hero to many atheists today. So his participation and relation to the other two atheists deserves special notice. You’ll find that Dawkins made numerous assertions and almost no arguments. If you disagree, you should be able to reconstruct his arguments by identifying individual premises and specific conclusions. So far, those who have praised Dawkins’s performance in the debate, all of whom have been atheists themselves, have not attempted this reconstruction. I urge them to try. I will gladly address carefully reconstructed arguments in the comments section of this post. Dawkins called religious belief “pathetic” and accused Bill Craig of making an emotional argument. As I stated in my brief closing statement, it was Dawkins, more than anyone else, who made an “emotional argument.” First, he gave no arguments against the existence of God. Second, he offered no rebuttals of the arguments we presented, and third, he dismissed religious belief as pathetic without argument. If I’m wrong about any of this, I would be happy to see evidence of my error and respond to whatever arguments he did present.
17. There has been considerable commentary about the “Craig vs. Dawkins debate” as a result of this event. Prior to this debate, Richard Dawkins had refused all invitations to debate Bill Craig. It’s for this reason that Bill was surprised to learn that Dawkins had agreed to participate in this debate. This, clearly, was the safest venue for Dawkins to appear in debate with Craig, since it was a three-on-three debate with unusually brief allocations of time for each speaker. But Dawkins was not debating Bill Craig only. He was in debate with three theists, in partnership with two fellow atheists. There was nothing the least bit threatening or intimidating about Dawkins on this occasion. I would happily debate him in a one-on-one situation. So if he prefers not to debate Bill Craig, for whatever reason, he’s welcome to debate with me.
18. Some have criticized the moderator of the debate for the style of his facilitation. But people fail to consider the total context of the debate. This was but one of many events scheduled in a three-day conference. Also, the debate was aired at the end of the day following the much-watched boxing match between Manny Pacquiao and Antonio Margarito. Hence, the pugilism metaphor so emphasized during the debate. I happen to know that some who watched the boxing match on Mexican television stayed tuned to channel 7 and watched the debate. I’ve heard it estimated that around 2 million viewers have seen the debate as a result. Andreas Roemer seems to have good instincts about how to raise public awareness of an event worthy of more attention.

Again, I hope to hear from you with your reflections about the debate. Before leaving comments, you may want to review the comments policy for this blog here.

Other places where the debate is being discussed:

• David Wolpe’s account at The Huffington Post
• Michael Shermer’s Account of the Debate
• Apologetics Guy
• If you wish to see comments by fevered supporters of Richard Dawkins, click here and here
• Atheist Media Blog
• Premier Community
• ID.Plus
• Wintery Knight here.
• Apologetics 315 and here and here
• Rational Skepticism
• MandM
• STR
• TheoBlog (in German/auf Deutsch)
• The Richard Dawkins Foundation
• Debunking Christianity
• Josué Ferrer: “Falacia atea”

Interview with Brian Auten

I was interviewed recently by Brian Auten. Most of Brian’s questions concern the topic of miracles. Today Brian has posted this audio interview at his website and can be heard here.

Doug’s other posts on the subject of miracles:

• “Do Miracles Happen Today?”
• In Defense of Miracles Reviewed
• MSNBC Reports on the Todd Bentley “Revival”

“If God, Why Evil?” Presentation Slides

Today I participated in the “Always Be Ready” conference in Downey, CA. The title of my presentation was “If God, Why Evil?”

You’re welcome to view the Keynote slides I used for this presentation. Just click on the following link:

Doug Geivett, “If God Why Evil” (2010.07.31)

Related post here.

Doug to Speak at the “Always Be Ready” Conference July 31

Doug will be speaking at the “Always Be Ready” conference at Calvary Chapel, Downey, CA—July 31, 2010—2:00-2:55 pm. Topic: “If God, Why Evil?”

For registration information and other details:

“Always Be Ready” Conference—Calvary Chapel Downey

This conference is sponsored by the Veritas Evangelical Seminary.

Update (1 August 2010):

Keynote slides for this presentation can be viewed here.

Polling Today’s Philosophers about What They Believe

Want to know what today’s philosophers believe? Anthony Gottlieb reports results of a poll taken by Australian philosopher David Chalmers. The Chalmers poll probes philosophers’ beliefs about

Comment on “Euthyphro’s Lament”

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Roger Morris has kindly referred me to a blog where the relation between God and morality is discussed in two unsigned posts: “Euthyphro’s Lament” and the briefer “One Other Thing” (in which the author promises that this is “the Absolute Bloody Final word from me” on the issue he raises).

The “Euthyphro problem” lies at the heart of a dialogue recorded by Plato, between Socrates and one called Euthyphro. This dialogue has a fitting title: Euthyphro; it is sometimes called The Euthyphro. Euthyphro is a great introduction to the Socratic method on a topic of broad interest because it concerns the nature of ‘piety.’ Socrates presses the question, “Is the pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because it is loved by the gods?” This is called a ‘dilemma’ because it seems to present Euthyphro with stark choices, both of which are troubling in their own way.

Let it be noted that the problem of the nature of piety is not resolved in this dialogue of Plato’s. Nor is it definitively settled that both lemmas set forth in Socrates’ question are impossibilities.

It’s worthwhile keeping this in mind when considering a modified version of the problem in contemporary discussions of the relation between God and morality. The question in this context differs from the original in two main respects: (1) the dilemma now assumes some version of monotheism, and (2) the dilemma may be expressed in terms of the will or commands of God, rather than in terms of what is loved or hated by God. Another possible difference is that (3) the dilemma is now less concerned with piety as a character trait than with moral actions (in obedience to divine commands).

Here’s a characteristic statement of the new form of the dilemma, expressed as a question:

Is a morally right action right because it is willed or commanded by God, or is it willed or commanded by God because it is morally right?

If an action is morally right because it is willed or commanded by God, then whatever God wills or commands is right, and would be right just in virtue of his willing or commanding it. It’s supposed to follow that God could will or command anything whatsoever—including actions we rightly abhor, such as rape and murder—and what is willed or commanded would be (for that reason alone) morally right.

On the other hand, if a morally right action is willed or commanded by God because it is right, then it’s supposed to follow that God, who is otherwise thought to be utterly sovereign over all things, is subservient to an ontologically independent (objectively existing) standard of right and wrong.

So we have it that either (a) the goodness of any right act is arbitrary, subject to divine whim, or (b) God is less than sovereign because subject to an independent moral authority.

From these stark choices it is sometimes argued that God does not exist, or that the concept of God is incoherent.

Consider the first horn of the dilemma. Why is the morality of a right act thought to be arbitrary? Because its rightness is linked to the will or commands of God. But that, it seems, is tantamount to saying that God’s will and commands are themselves arbitrary. But why think that? I see no reason to seize the other horn of the dilemma in order to avoid this supposed implication.

What about the second horn? Most of its formulations use terminology without clear delineation of their significance. We must know, for example, in what sense God is presumed to be sovereign, in what sense ultimate moral authority is thought to be independent or external to God (or God’s character), and in what sense God is to be considered subservient to this external standard. The burden of making these notions precise is weighty. It is also frequently ignored.

In “Euthyphro’s Lament,” the author attempts the required clarification by saying that “there is an objective standard – logically prior to God’s character – that constrains God’s character.” But I must say that the notion of an objective (moral) standard as “logically prior” to anything (be it God or something else) is less than clear, and the suggestion does little to illuminate the supposed problem. Further, we must understand this vague notion of “logical priority” before we can make any sense of the claim that some logically prior standard “constrains God’s character.” How does it “constrain”?

I think it also needs to be said that the formulation of divine command theory in the essay is awkward. The author says,

Briefly, Divine Command theory states that it is good to obey God’s commands.

A more adequate formulation is needed. Here’s a better approximation, I think:

What makes a morally right action right is that it is commanded by God, and what makes a morally wrong action wrong is that it is prohibited by God.

From this it does follow, I suppose, that it’s (morally) good to heed God’s commands. But that is a different matter.

On the divine command theory, God’s will determines the rightness or wrongness of morally significant human actions. The theory, as a theory of morality, is concerned with the moral character of human actions. It is a separate question why God wills what God wills.

I conclude with three brief points.

First, this post is not a defense of divine command theory, but an attempt to impose clarity in relation to a less than clear statement of the associated problems in a particular blog post.

Second, it is odd if the envisioned dilemma concerning God’s relation to morality implies that God does not exist. It is so odd, in fact, that it’s far more likely that the proposed dilemma is a clever contrivance with less bite than is often imagined.

One may say that the dilemma is not the mainstay of an argument against theism, that it is merely rhetorical, a challenge to the theist to explain precisely what is God’s relation to morality. Ah, and if the theist falters? What then? Surely this is supposed to mean something.

Or one may say that the dilemma showcases a problem for theism that—whether or not it entails that theism is false—delivers the naturalist from the threat of any moral argument for God’s existence. The proper answer to that is that there are varieties of arguments from morality for theism, some better than others (and some no good at all). The best arguments are invulnerable to the dilemma we have been considering. And they have the further advantage of highlighting severe limitations of utterly naturalistic conceptions of ethics.

Third, adapting the dilemma posed in Plato’s Euthyphro to current discussions of God and morality may preempt proper consideration of what is “logically prior” (if that means anything), namely, the question, “Why does God will what God wills?” The answer to that must depend on what sort of being God is. Suppose God is such that he is neither subject, in any meaningful sense, to some external standard of morality, nor good in some merely arbitrary sense. Is there really anything deeply disturbing about such a conception? Mysterious perhaps. But disturbing?

Suggested Reading:

• Norman Kretzmann, “Abraham, Isaac, and Euthyphro: God and the Basis of Morality.”
• Chapters dealing with divine command theory in Mark Timmons, Moral Theory: An Introduction.

William Lane Craig vs. Christopher Hitchens: First Report

Tonight, Biola University hosted a debate between William Lane Craig and Christopher Hitchens on the question “Does God Exist?” The debate was moderated by Hugh Hewitt and seen live by several thousand in attendance at Biola and many more at remote locations in 30 states and several countries.

I’ve just returned home from the event and will record a number of my observations as a first report from the front lines.

1. This event was no mere spectacle, but a legitimate debate that addressed substantive arguments.
2. Everybody behaved themselves, including members of the audience.
3. Bill Craig made two claims in his opening argument: (A) There are no good arguments for atheism, and (B) there are several good arguments for the existence of God (theism). The balance of his opening argument was devoted to four carefully delineated arguments and a fifth thesis about the role of experience in grounding belief in God. This organization of the case for God’s existence has been used by Bill Craig time and again. The first argument is a cosmological argument, based on the origin of the universe. The second was a version of the teleological argument that emphasizes the improbability of the existence of a universe inhabited by human beings, given the evidence of both physics and biology. Third, he argued that the best explanation for the existence of objective moral facts is the existence of God. Fourth, he stated three sets of historical facts that are uniformly accepted by New Testament scholars, which together provide ample evidence that Jesus Christ rose from the dead, implying the occurrence of an important miracle and hence the existence of God. Each argument was constructed as a valid deductive argument, so that rational denial of the conclusion would require a direct challenge to one or more of the premises in each argument. His fifth point was that belief in God can as well be grounded in direct experience of God, though this is not to be confused with an argument for the existence of God. He ended with a challenge to Christopher Hitchens to show how these arguments err, and also argue that God does not exist.
4. Bill Craig made the interesting point that believers in God should not be so distracted by arguments for the existence of God that they miss the experience of God.
5. In his opening argument, Christopher Hitchens argued first that Bill Craig is not a consistent evidentialist, and that, to the extent that Craig is an evidentialist, he is, like any evidentialist Christian, a “retrospective evidentialist” who appeals to evidence now that no theist could have centuries ago. Further to this point, Hitchens suggested that contemporary (Christian) theists have, in the face of scientific evidence for evolution, “retreated” from their earlier strategies by claiming that evolution is evidence for theism, or is at least compatible with theism. Next he argued that even if God did exist (by which I think he meant the God mentioned in the conclusion of Craig’s arguments), no reason has been given to believe that this God cares, while there are reasons to think this God is indifferent. (I think, consistent with his practice in his book god Is Not Great, Hitchens would use the word “god” without caps.) His third point was that Craig is obligated to “prove to a certainty” that God exists, while atheists like himself rightly value the role of doubt in the absence of evidence and intellectual humility. This led directly to disclaimers about Craig’s definition of the term “atheism”—Hitchens regards himself as an “a-theist” in the sense that he believes no good reasons exist for believing God exists and so he does not believe that God does exist. Thus, he does not claim to know that God does not exist; therefore, he has no obligation to argue that God does not exist. He concluded with a direct response to the teleological, or fine-tuning argument, for theism. First he said that most physicists acknowledge that “we hardly know what we don’t know” about the origin of the universe and its early history. This looks more like an objection to Craig’s cosmological argument, so Hitchens may have mispoken. He then said there were three “layman’s reasons” for rejecting the fine-tuning argument. I was only able to distinguish two, since they were not enumerated clearly. First, he asked whether prior to the beginning of the universe there was pre-existing matter, as a step toward the question, “Who designed the Designer?” Second, he asked whether theists have considered the “nothingness that is coming,” his point being that the universe will eventually fade into oblivion and that therefore the so-called “Designer” seems to have designed poorly.
6. The two opening speeches differed dramatically. Bill Craig laid out a case in straightforward manner, with numbered premises and his conclusion. (A complete outline of his cumulative case was included on one sheet of the program that was printed for the occasion.) Christopher Hitchens adopted more of a narrative style that was more loosely argued and less linear in its progression. Both were articulate and engaging.
7. In the rebuttal, cross-examination, and response portions of the debate that followed, Bill Craig pressed Christopher Hitchens on his conception of atheism, his reasons for being an atheist, and his responses to the arguments presented in Craig’s opening speech. In this respect, Craig was in greater control of themes in the debate. This was helped immensely by the clear progression, crisp identification, and repetition of his original arguments. Hitchens resisted Craig’s efforts to extract a more precise definition of Hitchens’s atheism than his simple denial that there is adequate evidence for theism. Hitchens claimed that if you believe the universe is designed, then you also have to believe the designer is short on the excellence attributed by theists to God. There is a tension between there being a god who is completely indifferent to human suffering, or a god who provides a bizarre remedy in the form of having “someone tortured to death during the Bronze Age” and Roman rule, a god who demands conformity to his requirements in order to be saved from damnation, and, in any case, who leaves countless individuals without opportunity to hear about and accept this remedy.
8. The most noteworthy difference between these debaters consists in this: preparation. One may agree or disagree with Bill Craig’s claims, but there can be no question that he was thoroughly prepared for every aspect of the debate and never faltered in his response to objections by Hitchens. Christopher Hitchens, on the other hand, dropped several of Craig’s opening arguments, and seriously misunderstood or distorted the moral argument, the argument from the resurrection of Jesus, and Craig’s appeal to experience. I think Craig was most successful in demonstrating the error in Hitchens’s discombobulated rendition of Craig’s moral argument. Whether the audience followed the competing interpretations of N. T. Wright’s historical argument concerning the probability of the resurrection is another matter. But I can vouch for Craig’s construal of Wright’s argument, and, for that matter, for Hitchens’s confusion on the point. As for the appeal to experience of God (and the witness of the Holy Spirit), I might have put the point differently than Craig did and treat it as a kind of evidence that serves the subject of the experience without the need for argument. But Bill Craig and I may have a different view of the epistemology of such experience.
9. Christopher Hitchens made a couple of odd points in his rebuttal, as if to answer arguments or objections that Bill Craig had not given. For example, he asserted that he believes in free will, and went on about it as if Craig had pressed him directly on this point. This was a strategic mistake, if only because it wasted valuable time that should have been devoted to what was already on the table. Worse, Craig could have challenged Hitchens’s claim to believe in free will, given his naturalism. I gather that Hitchens sensed this, saw its relevance to the question of moral conduct, and attempted to pre-empt Craig on the point. But Hitchens’s complete failure to understand the moral argument presented by Craig landed him in enough serious trouble as it was. Hitchens also digressed about the embarrassing canonization of Mother Theresa by the Roman Catholic Church. I suppose he couldn’t resist, since he had written a whole book on the subject. (See this link for the crass title of that book.)
10. The only thing that surprised me about Bill Craig’s strategy in the debate was his determination to get Hitchens to specify more precisely his self-identification as an atheist. Much of Craig’s cross-examination time was taken up with this question. That is due in part to Hitchens’s bobbing and weaving on the point. I understand Craig’s rationale for tasking Hitchens with clarification of his position. I’ve encountered the same maneuver in my debates with Michael Shermer and Greg Cavin, for example. As I see it, regardless of the standards of formal debate, both parties to a debate of such existential significance should be clear about their own positions and be prepared to present good reasons for them. (While this is a burden of proof issue, the term “burden of proof” never came up, if I remember correctly.) Christopher Hitchens has a worldview. It is thoroughly naturalistic and scientistic, and indeed materialistic. It hardly matters what he means by “atheism” in application to himself, since this is clearly his positive stance. And he made no attempt to argue that his worldview is true. Bill Craig is right about this.
11. Christopher Hitchens’s attempt to distinguish between the hubris of the argumentative theist (my term) and the intellectual humility of his kind of atheist was totally unconvincing. Hitchens’s tone in the debate, consistent with his hallmark practice, belied his disclaimers about claims to knowledge. Once, in his closing argument, Bill Craig drew attention to this point, and did so dramatically but graciously. He pointed out that Hitchens made his own truth claims on behalf of atheism, that he did so without supporting argument, and that “you’ve got to come to a debate prepared with arguments.” While Hitchens did make arguments, they were largely unfocused, sometimes disconnected, and often irrelevant.
12. The second half of cross-examination must have been interesting to the predominantly evangelical audience. Christopher Hitchens asked Bill Craig directly whether he believes that there are devils, that Jesus was born of a virgin, that some nonChristian religions are false, and that some Christian denominations entertain false beliefs. Craig answered each, respectively: yes, yes, yes, and yes. But he added (a) that the existence or non-existence of demons has no bearing on his argument from the resurrection for theism, (b) that while he did not think the virgin birth could be proved, whether it happened is also irrelevant to his case for theism, (c) that Islam is among the false religions, and (d) that while there are differences among Christian brethren (Craig is not a Calvinist but more of a Wesleyan, for example), their differences are on less substantive points. While Craig may not have expected this line of questioning, he answered well. It was a sign of Hitchens’s lack of preparation, I believe, that his cross-examination of Craig was unproductive. (One further indication of this is that Craig’s answers were never brought up for special criticism.)
13. The main development of the cross-examination period is that Hitchens allowed that morality could be “purely evolutionary and functional.” Given his comments on morality throughout the evening, I don’t see how they could be anything else than that on his view. Thus, he is, Craig would argue, caught in a contradiction if he also claims that morality is objective in the sense Craig defined. And Hitchens had made such a claim. Note: Hitchens could hardly have denied this and remained consistent with his condemnation of religion in his book.
14. Speaking of Hitchens’s condemnation of religion, I think he found the balance that was needed if he was to remain faithful to the spirit and tone of his book without completely alienating his audience. His diatribes in god Is Not Great are mean and visceral in the extreme. During tonight’s debate, he was more cautious in his declamations. He did say “I’ll be damned” if I don’t say what I really think of religion and Christianity. But this was mild in comparison with what Hitchen is capable of. The problem is—and he knew this—his off-the-cuff remarks were not germane to the debate. Someone reading his book for the first time after seeing this debate may be surprised by the venom they find, but they probably will not be shocked. I say this because I do think it was a delicate balancing act for him to be more measured while still acting in character.
15. Christopher Hitchens attempted to drag Old Testament accounts of “genocide” and other divine sanctions of dubious moral character into the debate. This was predictable. Bill Craig rightly noted that these complaints concern the inerrancy and inspiration of Scripture, and are not salient to his case for theism. Some in the audience may have wondered how Craig could avoid these issues and also invoke the New Testament in describing the grandeur of God’s plan of salvation. As it happens, Hitchens didn’t raise the point. But it also happens that there is no inconsistency in Craig’s view of the bearing of Scripture on aspects of the debate.
16. Another comparison of interest to me has to do with the existential appeal of their respective points of view. Bill Craig seemed actually to be enjoying the dialogue (as one of my daughters noted). Certainly he was unapologetic about his Christian faith. He spoke convincingly of the transformation of his life after believing in Christ. And he explained the basis Christians have for hope in this life and the next. He even urged Christopher Hitchens to become a Christian, since Hitchens wants to say that there are objective moral values but can’t account for them in his worldview. Craig said this without seeming the least bit supercilious. I thought Craig struck an excellent balance in describing the future hope of Christians and its bearing on the endurance of suffering now, and a Christian activism on behalf of those who are oppressed or even deprived of life. For his part, Hitchens explained that he finds meaning in life by seeking liberty for himself and for others, and that, since so much violence against humanity is done in the name of religion, he is constrained to combat religion publicly.
17. I’ve already mentioned how Christopher Hitchens responded to Bill Craig’s moral argument for theism. It struck me that this argument was the most widely discussed of them all. The irony is that for all that he had to say in response, Hitchens actually “dropped” the argument. (To say that he “dropped” the argument is to say, in debate-speak, that he didn’t actually address the argument.) In his response to Craig’s argument, Hitchens recast the argument as an argument that atheists can neither know what is morally right nor do the morally right thing unless they believe in God. That is not the argument at all. It baffles me that so many atheist, agnostic, and skeptical debaters distort this argument so consistently. The question is how to ground the objectivity of moral truths without reference to God, not whether moral truths can be known without believing in God or whether it’s possible to behave morally without believing in God. The point is neither epistemic nor behavioral, but ontological. My preferred formulation of the moral argument is a little different than Craig’s, but my experience has been the same as his. Debate opponents miss the point.
18. Returning, finally, to something I mentioned previously, this debate exposed a difference in preparation on the part of these two debaters. This is far more significant than it might seem at first. William Lane Craig has debated this topic dozens of times, without wavering from the same basic pattern of argument. He presents the same arguments in the same form, and presses his opponents in the same way for arguments in defense of their own worldviews. He’s consistent. He’s predictable. One might think that this is a liability, that it’s too risky to face a new opponent who has so much opportunity to review Craig’s specific strategy. But tonight’s debate proves otherwise. Hitchens can have no excuse for dropping arguments when he knows—or should know—exactly what to expect. Suppose one replies that William Craig is a more experienced debater and a trained philosopher, while Christopher Hitchens is a journalist working outside the Academy. That simply won’t do as a defense of Hitchens. First, Hitchens is no stranger to debate. Second, he is clearly a skillful polemicist. Third—and most important—Hitchens published a book, god Is Not Great, in which he makes bold claims against religion in general and Christianity in particular. With his book, he threw down the challenge. To his credit, he rose to meet a skillful challenger. But did he rise to the occasion? Did he acquit himself well? At one point he acknowledged that some of his objections to the designer argument were “layman’s” objections. His book, I believe, is also the work of a layman. It appears to have been written for popular consumption and without concern for accountability to Christians whose lives are dedicated to the defense of the Gospel.

Much more can be said about the debate. I’m confident that it will elicit much discussion worldwide. Viewers and listeners will draw their own conclusions. But after tonight, there is reason to think—as Bill Craig suggested—that we may soon witness a great renaissance of Christianity.

Recommended Reading:

• William Lane Craig, Reasonable Faith
• Christopher Hitchens, god Is Not Great
• Norman L. Geisler and Patrick Zikeran, The Apologetics of Jesus: A Caring Approach to Dealing with Doubters (reviewed briefly at this post).
• Joe Carter & John Coleman, How to Argue Like Jesus: Learning Persuasion from History’s Greatest Teacher

For details on the 2010 debate between Richard Dawkins, Michael Shermer, and Matt Ridley on the atheist side, and William Lane Craig, Doug Geivett, and David Wolpe on the theist side, go here.

Alvin Plantinga’s *Warranted Christian Belief* Now on CCEL

You can now find Alvin Plantinga’s book Warranted Christian Belief (Oxford University Press, 2000) at Christian Classics Ethereal Library. Click here. It can be read online or downloaded in plain text for free. For the modest fee of $2.95 you can download it in PDF format.