Layers Of Apologetics

[muichimotsu]

In discussions defending Christianity as true, rational or otherwise something you ought to believe, I have to wonder if many times that a person tries too hard to utilize one tactic for most skeptics they approach.

The initial layer that I feel like is skipped over so often is semantical: does "God" as a concept make sense in any way that will necessarily be conveyed to everyone equally in effectiveness?

After that would be ontological: even if one could agree on the cogency of a "God" concept, the question becomes its nature and how one can demonstrate it, which gets into falsifiability and such as regards a transcendent being.

Epistemological inquiries seem more like where apologetics starts, already assuming that a person would necessarily agree on even basic notions of a "God" entity for the purposes of discussion and then defend how they believe the bible in particular is a source of accurate knowledge about "God" and its intentions, etc.

But what would one do in regards to someone who isn't convinced that God is a cogent or otherwise coherent concept in the first place?

 

[createdtoworship]

In discussions defending Christianity as true, rational or otherwise something you ought to believe, I have to wonder if many times that a person tries too hard to utilize one tactic for most skeptics they approach.

The initial layer that I feel like is skipped over so often is semantical: does "God" as a concept make sense in any way that will necessarily be conveyed to everyone equally in effectiveness?

After that would be ontological: even if one could agree on the cogency of a "God" concept, the question becomes its nature and how one can demonstrate it, which gets into falsifiability and such as regards a transcendent being.

Epistemological inquiries seem more like where apologetics starts, already assuming that a person would necessarily agree on even basic notions of a "God" entity for the purposes of discussion and then defend how they believe the bible in particular is a source of accurate knowledge about "God" and its intentions, etc.

But what would one do in regards to someone who isn't convinced that God is a cogent or otherwise coherent concept in the first place?

If you see something made, you know it had a maker. God is proven. Done. I have done apologetics for probably twenty years, and when you get into intelligent design, people take exception with what is design, and what intelligent means. Which means there is weakness. However I heard an evangelist say this one time, and it was way simpler and clearer than anything I was trying to do. I was over thinking it. I think you are too. What I mean is, do you honestly think a creator of the universe is incoherent? No. If anything that is probably the most coherent concept we know of. If the universe does not need causation then nothing inside the universe needs a cause, and the entire premise of cause and effect tumbles. The universe is made by the big bang according to most scientists. By a host of evidence they claim is valid. So using their own theories of the big bang we know the universe was made. So logically my premise is true, if you see something made, you know it had a maker. Done, proven. Take it easy. I hope you find what you are looking for in life. (unsubscribing)

 

[muichimotsu]

If you see something made, you know it had a maker. God is proven. Done. I have done apologetics for probably twenty years, and when you get into intelligent design, people take exception with what is design, and what intelligent means. Which means there is weakness. However I heard an evangelist say this one time, and it was way simpler and clearer than anything I was trying to do. I was over thinking it. I think you are too. What I mean is, do you honestly think a creator of the universe is incoherent? No. If anything that is probably the most coherent concept we know of. If the universe does not need causation then nothing inside the universe doesn't need a cause, and the entire premise of cause and effect tumbles.

Except we don't see things made in nature in any way comparable to how I can see how my desk or computer is made, you're making a category error to apply such a painfully weak argument from design.

At most, even if we granted that simplistic notion, it would demonstrate a designer (not prove, that's not what's done in philosophy or most sciences), which doesn't have to be divine, could easily be an alien or the like

Yes, because the arguments for the creator hinge on making special pleading for that creator violating the laws that they establish as fact for everything else, contingency, etc.

Methinks you're assuming too much about me based on what you think is common sense, when I'd argue I don't think of things in a teleological sense to that extent of seeing agency behind things that don't necessitate it by virtue of their existence, particularly in nature versus things that necessarily require a mind behind them to construct, etc. Whereas a tree doesn't need a mind behind it to have come about over billions of years of natural processes

The universe is caused, but I don't pretend to have absolute knowledge in any sense of what that cause consists of, only that the evidence we have suggests that it came to be, but not that we can go any further in investigating, so it becomes speculative and a waste of time and energy to suggest you know anything rather than merely believing it.

Causality doesn't require a creator to be a factor in things that are extant in the nature we see with the universe. Applying the anthropic principle is why you and so many others will insist there has to be a creator, because you're utilizing a common, but not universal, notion about "God" that anthropomorphizes and exaggerates qualities of a human to a point that it becomes perfect and thus can be defended against objections by special pleading, etc, without having to demonstrate it, only rationalize that it makes "sense"

The Big Bang in NO way suggests the universe was made, that's insinuating particular notions onto something that we observe as occurring in nature, not something that by its qualities, requires it to have been made (a car, etc). The universe is not mechanical, it's regular within the scales that the processes we observe and can measure

 

[NBB]

When you tell a little kid about God, they seem to understand God very naturally, then as an adult we complicate things without need sometimes.

 

[muichimotsu]

When you tell a little kid about God, they seem to know the concept of God very well, then as an adult we complicate things without need sometimes.

A childlike concept of God is hardly going to be something self evident, you're teaching them the notions and they understand in simplistic terms, that's not evidence that God is cogent, it's that over millennia, people realized that appealing to authority already works with kids, so just exaggerating and reifying the authority to something like "God" will also work with kids, especially if you indoctrinate them to not really be critical of their beliefs, but hold them because conviction is somehow more important than being correct.

You've failed to make an argument here, but just spout a cliched aphorism with little substance to it. As a child, one might think it's common they have imaginary friends: I didn't, so the problem could just as easily be a matter of thinking God is universal because so many people are convinced.

But that's an appeal not only to popularity, but credulity, people being convinced because they just think there "must be something out there" and then go into vague spiritual notions of a creator because they're working on their own human preconceptions about how things work, which just leads into scientific ignorance, etc.

 

[GaveMeJoy]

In discussions defending Christianity as true, rational or otherwise something you ought to believe, I have to wonder if many times that a person tries too hard to utilize one tactic for most skeptics they approach.

The initial layer that I feel like is skipped over so often is semantical: does "God" as a concept make sense in any way that will necessarily be conveyed to everyone equally in effectiveness?

After that would be ontological: even if one could agree on the cogency of a "God" concept, the question becomes its nature and how one can demonstrate it, which gets into falsifiability and such as regards a transcendent being.

Epistemological inquiries seem more like where apologetics starts, already assuming that a person would necessarily agree on even basic notions of a "God" entity for the purposes of discussion and then defend how they believe the bible in particular is a source of accurate knowledge about "God" and its intentions, etc.

But what would one do in regards to someone who isn't convinced that God is a cogent or otherwise coherent concept in the first place?

I mean old fashioned prayer might not be as effective as arguments, apologetics, debate and convincing...but you never know

 

[muichimotsu]

I mean old fashioned prayer might not be as effective as arguments, apologetics, debate and convincing...but you never know

Again, that boils down to assuming that someone will take prayer as a compelling solution in the same vein as "God" just being common sense and not something subject to subjective interpretations and understandings

Why would I pray anymore than take hallucinogenic drugs under some assumption I'll have a spiritual experience?

 

[civilwarbuff]

These discussions always go the predictable route: Someone makes some claim about God not existing. Defenders rush in and offer evidence to contradict the OP. And the OP posters response?: 'Huh uh, that's not true' all the while offering nothing but opinion and speculation as a defense.
My response is simple: When you pass on you can take it up with God. And I wouldn't be surprised if during the conversation the question comes up: '....and you didn't believe I existed because someone told you what?'
Good luck on your search.....

 

[muichimotsu]

I'm not making a claim that God doesn't exist, either metaphysically or conceptually, I'm not convinced that the concept is remotely consistent or coherent, to say nothing of not being convinced by attempts to demonstrate God's existence, either a priori or a posteriori. Not being convinced of something doesn't mean you affirm the contrary as true

My "defense" to attempts to contradict is in the OP: if you already assume your deity is cogent, you're not going to get far unless you can actually demonstrate it, unless you just hope most people agree with whatever god concept you have, which is hedging your bets.

If all you're going to do is throw out passive aggressive threats of an afterlife, as if you're absolutely confident your position is true and will be vindicated, methinks you never cared about whether your beliefs are true, but whether they have "power" behind them to use as a "warning" to others, like you're superior in any remote fashion

 

[civilwarbuff]

If all you're going to do is throw out passive aggressive threats of an afterlife, as if you're absolutely confident your position is true and will be vindicated, methinks you never cared about whether your beliefs are true, but whether they have "power" behind them to use as a "warning" to others, like you're superior in any remote fashion

Nothing passive/agressive about my comment. it is just that we already know how the story ends.....

 

[muichimotsu]

Nothing passive/agressive about my comment. it is just that we already know how the story ends.....

You believe, you don't know, because that'd entail you have knowledge equivalent to God, which would be blasphemous. At least use the right word to have that humility that's supposed to be emblematic of someone who only seeks to glorify God. Otherwise you make yourself look, again, like you don't care about truth, just obedience and authority.

 

[civilwarbuff]

You believe, you don't know, because that'd entail you have knowledge equivalent to God, which would be blasphemous.

Nothing blasphemous about it, just read the prophetic books in the Bible then you to will also know how the story ends.
Have you read the Bible?....I mean with understanding?....searching commentaries for those things which tend to be hidden for non-believers?

 

[muichimotsu]

You do realize you're just question begging right? We have no reason outside of your faith's assertion that those prophets have any significance that isn't attributable to the same "fulfillment" we'd find in Nostradamus.

The story's "ending" is in Revelation, and that supposedly was considered iffy back in canonization for the Bible, and isn't remotely agreed upon by Christianity at large to be something yet to be fulfilled (preterism and the whole gammut of eschatology creates a web I can't imagine someone unraveling)

With understanding of some faith based preconception? No, because I wasn't convinced it was anything more than mythology given significance and even commentaries don't grant it more credence, just historical and textual background that arguably makes it more suspect as to any real inspiration, which is post hoc rationalization of the stories that don't mesh unless you fit them into some narrative the Jewish don't agree with in regards to Christians essentially leeching off them to point to their messiah (as opposed to the Jewish one)

 

[2PhiloVoid]

In discussions defending Christianity as true, rational or otherwise something you ought to believe, I have to wonder if many times that a person tries too hard to utilize one tactic for most skeptics they approach.

The initial layer that I feel like is skipped over so often is semantical: does "God" as a concept make sense in any way that will necessarily be conveyed to everyone equally in effectiveness?

After that would be ontological: even if one could agree on the cogency of a "God" concept, the question becomes its nature and how one can demonstrate it, which gets into falsifiability and such as regards a transcendent being.

Epistemological inquiries seem more like where apologetics starts, already assuming that a person would necessarily agree on even basic notions of a "God" entity for the purposes of discussion and then defend how they believe the bible in particular is a source of accurate knowledge about "God" and its intentions, etc.

But what would one do in regards to someone who isn't convinced that God is a cogent or otherwise coherent concept in the first place?

I would just ask that person if they think all of their own conceptions of the world, life and existence are completely and utterly cogent and otherwise coherent, and what they think "cogency" and "coherence" are, as far as they're concerned ...

... and that would be that, and I would just sit back, listen and learn in the hopes that they could help me out of my existentially inclined ignorance and in my lack of assurance in who and what I am and where I'm going as I move on into the future.

 

[civilwarbuff]

You do realize you're just question begging right? We have no reason outside of your faith's assertion that those prophets have any significance that isn't attributable to the same "fulfillment" we'd find in Nostradamus.

The story's "ending" is in Revelation, and that supposedly was considered iffy back in canonization for the Bible, and isn't remotely agreed upon by Christianity at large to be something yet to be fulfilled (preterism and the whole gammut of eschatology creates a web I can't imagine someone unraveling)

With understanding of some faith based preconception? No, because I wasn't convinced it was anything more than mythology given significance and even commentaries don't grant it more credence, just historical and textual background that arguably makes it more suspect as to any real inspiration, which is post hoc rationalization of the stories that don't mesh unless you fit them into some narrative the Jewish don't agree with in regards to Christians essentially leeching off them to point to their messiah (as opposed to the Jewish one)

Thank you for making my initial point that no matter what evidence someone provides your answer is 'Huh uh, not true'.
Hasta la vista...

 

[MrsFoundit]

The initial layer that I feel like is skipped over so often is semantical: does "God" as a concept make sense in any way that will necessarily be conveyed to everyone equally in effectiveness?

Yes, a discussion about the existence of "God" requires a mutually acceptable definition or concept as to what "God" means as a word.

But what would one do in regards to someone who isn't convinced that God is a cogent or otherwise coherent concept in the first place?

One can discuss the issue "is God a cogent concept?" first, if not the discussion will be subject to communication failure, on account of the need for a mutually acceptable definition of the concept "God".

 

[gaara4158]

I would just ask that person if they think all of their own conceptions of the world, life and existence are completely and utterly cogent and otherwise coherent, and what they think "cogency" and "coherence" are, as far as they're concerned ...

... and that would be that, and I would just sit back, listen and learn in the hopes that they could help me out of my existentially inclined ignorance and in my lack of assurance in who and what I am and where I'm going as I move on into the future.

I’m sure to such a person it would look like you were trying to muddy the water rather than elucidate just what you mean by “God.”

 

[2PhiloVoid]

I’m sure to such a person it would look like you were trying to muddy the water rather than elucidate just what you mean by “God.”

Really? My passively being willing to listen to, ponder over and then contemplate what another person has to say .................. could be perceived as "muddying the water"? I think you misunderstand what I was getting at in my response to the other poster. I'm under no impression, and have never been under the impression, that describing God in some kind of 'clear' way is open to purely human investigation. No, the best we have is the figure of Jesus Christ to serve as an illustration; and I don't think anyone can put upon me the responsibility to elucidate more clearly, beyond, or in addition to, what little that the entire world has already been given, message wise, through the earliest Christians.

How could I possibly say "more" for the sake of clarity about the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob than what has already been said? It's not like I have a hotline to God and I can just ring Him up for an interview so that I can better field anyone's random questions ...

 

[2PhiloVoid]

In discussions defending Christianity as true, rational or otherwise something you ought to believe, I have to wonder if many times that a person tries too hard to utilize one tactic for most skeptics they approach.

The initial layer that I feel like is skipped over so often is semantical: does "God" as a concept make sense in any way that will necessarily be conveyed to everyone equally in effectiveness?

Not really, and this is more or less what I've been essentially saying all along.

After that would be ontological: even if one could agree on the cogency of a "God" concept, the question becomes its nature and how one can demonstrate it, which gets into falsifiability and such as regards a transcendent being.

Not if there isn't a single one of us who is privileged enough to have a special inside scoop on God, by God. I don't have an insider's scoop; but I'm pretty sure most folks here don't either. So, to me, all this ontological guesswork that is spawned and spatted back and forth is just spitting in the wind in the hopes that........well, I don't really know what some folks are hoping for in this regard.

Epistemological inquiries seem more like where apologetics starts, already assuming that a person would necessarily agree on even basic notions of a "God" entity for the purposes of discussion and then defend how they believe the bible in particular is a source of accurate knowledge about "God" and its intentions, etc.

Nope; because no one can agree on what exactly epistemology is, how it works, how it should proceed, and when it provides 'sufficient' conceptual substance for our attempts to justify this or that claim toward a state of knowledge and/or truth.

But what would one do in regards to someone who isn't convinced that God is a cogent or otherwise coherent concept in the first place?

Be nice to them, I guess? Some people need that as a starting point, it seems. Maybe that's part of the reason Jesus said some things pertaining to "loving others," a point He made that I will admit that I have a difficult time doing in ways that will be seen or felt or heard as "being loving."

 

[gaara4158]

Really? My passively being willing to listen to, ponder over and then contemplate what another person has to say .................. could be perceived as "muddying the water"? I think you misunderstand what I was getting at in my response to the other poster. I'm under no impression, and have never been under the impression, that describing God in some kind of 'clear' way is open to purely human investigation. No, the best we have is the figure of Jesus Christ to serve as an illustration; and I don't think anyone can put upon me the responsibility to elucidate more clearly, beyond, or in addition to, what little that the entire world has already been given, message wise, through the earliest Christians.

How could I possibly say "more" for the sake of clarity about the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob than what has already been said?

I may be misreading you, but your response to a person whose position is “I haven’t come across a definition or conception of God that is coherent or cogent enough for me to make a meaningful judgment on the likelihood of its existence,” seemed to be “Well, what is anything, really?” Forgive me, perhaps the apologetics forum has made me jaded, but this looked a lot like an opening move to a script that would have the person struggle to articulate clear definitions for life, existence, and the world, at which point you would ask why they accept those things, elusive definitions and all, but not God. This derails the conversation from “What do you mean by God?” to “How do we decide what we know and don’t know?”

Your further response reveals at least that you’re talking about the Judeo-Christian God, which isn’t a foregone conclusion when you’re speaking with someone who says they don’t really understand what God is. But that kind of answer is more along the lines of what such a person would be looking for, although pointing to set of scriptures and saying you can’t be any clearer than what’s already written still isn’t quite helpful enough.